Dandelion in the Spring
by hmweasley
Summary: On the day of the 74th Annual Hunger Games' reaping, it's not Prim's and Peeta's names that Effie Trinket draws. What comes next?
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: I've been writing this for nearly a year. It's such a relief to have this first chapter posted.**

Katniss kept her head low as she walked through the schoolyard. Around her, other students mingled, sometimes shouting at each other around Katniss as she passed.

It took a ridiculously long time for her to weave her way through the students to the bench where she typically met Prim. Most days, she was the first one there. She'd sit around, maybe do part of her homework, and wait for Prim to get done with her usual chatter with her friends.

That day, however, Katniss found Prim already sitting on the bench with her two best friends on either side of her. Katniss could immediately tell that something was wrong. She rushed forward, ignoring the girls whose names she could barely remember, and knelt in front of her sister.

"Is it your lungs again?" she asked.

Prim had the same pale face and hunched over posture that often indicated such a thing.

Prim opened her mouth to answer but let out a small whine before she could say anything.

"She started touching her chest during Physics," one girl said, her eyes wide. "When the bell rang, we could barely get her out here."

"Can you walk?" Katniss asked Prim.

Prim shook her head in defeat.

"It's too hard to breathe," she said in a raspy whisper. "I want to lay down."

"We have to get you to a bed first," Katniss pointed out. "And that means getting to the Seam. Come on, we'll make it."

Katniss didn't like forcing Prim to walk when she could hardly breathe, but it really was necessary. Their mother was the only one in Twelve who had any idea how to treat Prim when she had an attack like this. There was nowhere else for them to go.

Years of experience told Prim she had no choice but to listen, so she accepted Katniss' help to stand, whimpering as she went. Prim's friends tried to step forward, but Katniss held up a hand.

"I've got her," she said.

Prim was small, and Katniss was more than capable of supporting her weight. It would be a difficult journey home, but she could do it by herself. It was better than bringing along Prim's friends and being forced to let them inside the house. They were both merchant kids, and the few times they'd visited the Seam, Katniss had been less than enthused by their thinly concealed wariness.

So great were her efforts to make progress that Katniss didn't notice Madge approaching until she was several feet away. She had that sympathetic look on her face that always seemed more genuine from her than from most. Katniss hated having it directed towards her or her family.

"Are you taking her home like that?"

Katniss could only blink for a few seconds. She sat next to Madge every day at lunch, but they spoke to each other infrequently. Sometimes she forgot what Madge's voice even sounded like.

"Where else am I supposed to take her?" Katniss snapped.

Madge cringed but, steeling herself, took another step forward.

"She's not going to make it," Madge said. "Look at her."

Katniss did, though she knew what she'd find. Prim was damp with sweat, and though she was watching Katniss and Madge with awareness, she wasn't willing to use what energy she had to speak up for herself as they talked over her.

"My mom can help her," Katniss said. "I have to take her home."

Madge hesitated, fiddling with a hangnail as she looked past Katniss in the direction they had come from.

"You could bring her to my house?" she suggested. "She can wait in there while you go get your mom?"

Katniss, frozen, blinked at Madge. She looked down at Prim, who was looking up at her with wide, pleading eyes. She sighed. It was a tempting offer in that it was better for Prim, but Katniss couldn't help but feel a prickle of worry over being in the mayor's house. That was were important decisions were first handed down. It provided many opportunities for getting in trouble, and Madge expected her to leave Prim alone there.

Her uncertainty was clear, and Prim tugged weakly on her sleeve.

"Katniss, please."

The small request broke her. She gave Madge a short nod and even let her come to Prim's other side and support some of her weight, though Katniss was still doing the bulk of the work as they moved forward.

They hadn't even made it halfway when they were stopped by a, "Need any help."

Katniss inwardly cursed. Years of being ignored, and Prim being sick suddenly meant she had to speak to everyone. She turned around as best as she could with her arms around Prim.

It was Peeta Mellark. Katniss used adjusting her grip on Prim as an excuse to look away from him.

She'd never spoken to Peeta, but she knew him well enough that she would have recognized him a mile away. The day with the bread flashed through her mind unbidden. Katniss had the distinct urge to be softer with him than she had with Madge, but she squashed it.

"We're fine. Thanks."

The hesitant smile on Peeta's face morphed into a worried frown. Katniss paid him no attention as she made a move to continue forward. Prim and Madge didn't follow, and Katniss was forced to stop again, glaring at them both.

"I'm getting a little tired," Madge admitted. "Maybe it's a good idea to let Peeta help."

Katniss cursed Madge for never having done anything close to heavy lifting in her life. She very well could have support Prim all the way to Madge's house by herself. She'd had to do so for farther distances before, but Madge had Prim looking at her expectantly too, and Katniss knew she was going to give in.

"Fine." She glanced at Peeta. "Thanks."

Peeta was sure whether the 'thanks' had been meant for him, but he nodded as he stepped forward, taking Madge's place. Prim happily wrapped an arm around him to support herself.

"It's okay, Katniss," he said. "I can get her."

Katniss didn't say anything as she took a small step away from her sister. Unlike Madge, Peeta had plenty of strength from wrestling and working in the bakery. There was no doubt that he could support Prim alone, but that only made Katniss more anxious about letting him take her. Peeta hurried Prim along to Madge's house at a quicker pace than Katniss had been managing, and Katniss was no more than a step behind, determined not to let her sister out of her sight lest something terrible happen.

Madge hurried in front, unlocking and opening doors as she went. Even in the current circumstances, Katniss couldn't help but inspect her surroundings for any potential dangers as they entered the Undersee home.

The room Madge led them to was furnished with several plush chairs and a long sofa upon which Madge motioned for Peeta to lay Prim. It was decorated to an extent that was unheard of in the rest of the district, though it was nothing like the Capitol houses that were always on TV. The room alone was a third of the size of the Everdeens' whole house.

Not for the first time, Katniss wondered how comfortable it would be to have a whole room to oneself like Madge undoubtedly did further back in the house.

There was nothing that appeared inherently dangerous, though Katniss made a mental note that accidentally jostling something might have resulted in a bill she was unwilling to pay due to the breakable nature of many of the items. She couldn't understand decorations like that. They made a place feel inhospitable.

"Thank you," Prim told Peeta. "I feel better now that I'm lying down. This couch is really comfortable, Madge."

Both of them smiled at her in the fond way Prim managed to pull out of people.

Katniss, meanwhile, hovered in the doorway, torn between her desire to watch over Prim and the pressing need to find her mother. She was still trying to work out the best course of action when Peeta opened his mouth to speak. A split second later, a middle aged woman entered the room from another doorway, a hand held low over her eyes.

"What's going on?" she asked in slurred speech.

Katniss had only seen Mrs. Undersee a handful of times when she'd been well enough to attend events, but she was instantly recognizable from her similarity to Madge, who had hurried over to the woman as soon as she saw her.

"Prim was having trouble, Mom. I told her she could rest here while Katniss went to get their mom."

The woman's demeanor changed at the mention of Prim. She stiffened and dropped her hand from her eyes to stare. Her eyes only grew wider when Madge pointed to Katniss.

"Everdeen," she muttered to herself. "Your mother…"

Katniss' brow furrowed.

The woman, who had had to support herself by leaning against the doorframe only moments before, hurried to Prim and began inspecting her with an air of concern. She leaned down just as Prim launched into a coughing fit.

"Poor girl," Mrs. Undersee muttered. "Poor, poor girl. Does it hurt?"

Prim's eyes were wide. She was as unsure about this as Katniss. Her responding nod made it seem as if she weren't entirely sure she was in pain.

There was a moment of indecision in Mrs. Undersee's eyes before she grew determined. Then she hunched over, a hand once again to her head.

Madge rushed forward.

"Mom, you need to get back in bed. Remember what Dr. Aurelius said."

Mrs. Undersee obeyed her daughter's orders, allowing Madge to guide her out the doorway she'd come from. Once they were gone, Katniss became aware of Peeta once again.

She hadn't moved from the doorway from which they'd entered, but Peeta had retreated to a corner on the opposite side of the room as if determined to get himself as much out of the way as possible. He couldn't leave; Katniss had blocked his only escape without meaning too.

Not that he wanted to leave. Katniss had no idea what he wanted. She was still trying to figure out why he had helped.

She had caught him watching her. Ignoring it, she finally moved, hurrying towards Prim and giving her a once-over similar to Mrs. Undersee's a minute before.

"Katniss, I need Mom," Prim whined.

Katniss gripped her hand as she perched herself on what little of the couch Prim hadn't taken for herself.

"I know, but I don't want to leave you."

"I can watch her," Peeta offered.

"You already helped carry her here. You don't need to stay," Katniss said in a shorter tone than was polite.

Peeta was saved from answering by the sound of Madge's panicked voice.

"Mom, Mom, no. You can't—"

Mrs. Undersee barged into the room, gripping a small tin box with white knuckled hands. She hurried to Prim's side and placed the box on the floor to inspect her a second time.

"Does it still hurt?" she asked.

Prim nodded, looking wary. Mrs. Undersee glanced at Katniss and found something in her expression that made her take several steps away from the couch.

"You're Sylvia's daughter, right?" the woman asked breathlessly.

She was staring at Prim as if she were a mirage.

"Why?" Katniss asked before Prim could provide her with an answer.

An answer didn't come to Mrs. Undersee, just a scramble of words. She eventually gave up and instead began fumbling with the lid of her tin, accidentally dropping it once she'd gotten it unstuck.

"Mom, no," Madge whined, trying to tug the tin out of her hands.

The jostling caused one syringe to fall to the ground. Mrs. Undersee gave a wordless cry and knelt to pick it up. She held it up to the light, turning it around to inspect it for possible impurities.

The syringe was full of a clear liquid that Katniss was sure she recognized despite never having seen it actually used.

"One month," Mrs. Undersee muttered as she inspected every inch of the syringe. "Needs to last one month."

She glanced at Prim again, and Katniss took a step to the side to block her from Mrs. Undersee's view. Mrs. Undersee looked at Katniss instead, taking a step forward and raising her tin.

"Morphling. It helps with pain."

"No," Katniss said suddenly. "You're not giving her that stuff. She doesn't need it."

"But," Mrs. Undersee looked into the tin, "it helps."

"No," Katniss repeated firmly.

Though she had no direct experience with the drug in question, she had seen the Morphlings on TV like everyone else in Panem had. Supposedly, the drug was completely safe in limited dosage, but such portrayals did little to convince her of that.

"This has happened before," she continued. "She got by fine without it."

Mrs. Undersee's shoulders fell. She stared into the tin for several long moments before nodding and backing away, never taking her eyes off her drugs.

Katniss watched her as if she'd make a run for Prim, but a sharp round of coughing caught her attention. She whirled around, reaching for Prim's shoulders.

The fit lasted for more than a minute, with Katniss growing increasingly panicked. Her mom had always begun to tend to her by the time it had gotten this far, and it seemed to be getting worse.

"I need to get Mom."

Though she was speaking to Prim, Katniss' eyes glanced around the room as if her mother would appear from thin air.

Prim reached out to grip her hand.

"I'll be fine, Katniss. Promise."

"We'll watch her," Madge agreed.

Katniss was momentarily confused about Madge's use of 'we' before she remembered that Peeta was still watching them from the corner. She glanced at him, and he nodded. Suddenly, the idea of leaving Prim felt even scarier.

Her hesitation was clear on her face when she looked at Prim. Movement caught her eye, and she looked up to see Peeta standing behind the couch, looking down at them.

"I can go get your mom and bring her back. You stay here with Prim."

For a few seconds, all Katniss could do was stare. The idea of Peeta in the Seam was too preposterous to imagine.

"Have you ever been to the Seam?"

Peeta shrugged.

"Once or twice."

Katniss was pretty sure he was lying. She'd never seen him there, and she'd have remembered if she had.

"You don't know where I live."

Another shrug.

"If you give me the address, I can figure it out, and I promise to be quick about it."

Katniss found herself rattling off the address, much to her surprise. The only other time she'd given it to anyone had been when she'd signed up for tessarae. Even then, she'd written it on an official piece of paper. She'd never had a reason to say it out loud before.

Peeta hurried out the door without saying anything else. Katniss watched him go until a squeeze of her hand from Prim turned her attention back.

"It's okay," Prim said. "He'll get her."


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: This is the only chapter where we leave Katniss for part of it.**

Katniss found herself pacing as they waited for Peeta to return. She went back and forth across the room, not confident that Peeta would even be able to find her house let alone bring her mother back.

"Why is he helping?" she found herself asking Madge. "I've never spoken to him before. Have you?"

She turned to face Prim as she asked her the question, her arms crossed in accusation.

Prim shook her head without lifting it from the pillow Madge had offered her.

"Never," she said, bringing a hand up to her chest and coughing.

"Peeta's a good guy," Madge said quietly.

When Katniss turned to look at her, she hesitated before continuing.

"I don't fit in at school. You know that. Most of the merchant kids don't care for me. They've always ignored me. I can tell they don't trust me because of my dad. Except Peeta. He has his friends, but he always says hello in the hall or on the street. He asks me how I am sometimes. That's more than I can say for most people."

"So he's capable of conversation," Katniss said. "That's not the same thing as offering to run all the way to the Seam and back when you don't know where you're going."

"He _has_ been there."

Katniss turned back to Prim.

"What do you mean?"

"I've seen him before." There was a pause as she coughed. "He was walking around the Seam."

"Why?"

No one came to the Seam unless they lived there. That was the way life in District 12 worked. No one from town had any reason to visit the parts of the district where they might start to think of themselves as not being quite as bad off as they had believed themselves to be.

Prim shook her head, unable to speak as she coughed.

"He really is a nice guy, Katniss," Madge said. "He wants to help."

"He's given me cookies before," Prim admitted, her eyes averted as if she were worried that she would be scolded for taking them. "He saw me looking into the bakery and came out to ask me if I wanted one." She coughed. "It was a fresh one too, not a stale one they couldn't sell. He snuck it out. His mom didn't see."

A cookie wasn't bread, but in many ways, it was better. Katniss would always feel indebted to anyone who offered Prim a few more calories than she would have otherwise gotten. She added Prim's story to her growing list of ways that Peeta Mellark confused her.

"He enjoys handing out free food?" Katniss said. "He's an idiot."

"Or someone who cares more about other people than himself," Madge said quietly.

XXX

Though Katniss had given Peeta a street name, signs were nonexistent in District 12. Street names lived in the minds of the inhabitants and in official government records that no one got to see. If you needed to go somewhere, you knew where it was or were given directions by someone who did.

After a few panicked turns, he stopped someone to ask. The old man was startled to see a a blond boy come hurtling up to him. Peeta felt as out of place as if he'd been plunked down in the Capitol, but even there, his hair and eye color might not have been as much of a giveaway of his outsider status as they were in the Seam.

"Everdeen?" the man repeated after Peeta made his inquiry.

"Yes," Peeta said. "Please, it's important."

The man pointed behind Peeta in the same direction from where he'd just come.

"They live down that way," the man said. "On the corner. Look for the white and black goat outside."

Peeta hardly waited for the man to finish speaking before he was hurrying in the direction with a quick, "Thank you," tossed over his shoulder.

The house was easy to spot once he knew to look for the goat. The animal had eaten all of the grass that might have formerly been in the yard and watched Peeta approach with an intensity that made him wary.

He felt as if he were doing something wrong as he walked through the yard, carefully avoiding the goat. This was _her_ place. He hadn't been brave enough to speak to her until today, yet he was at her house, a space he was sure few others had been invited to see.

The door felt as flimsy as the rest of the house looked. Peeta knocked hesitantly, not wanting to break it.

"Mrs. Everdeen," he called when there was no immediate answer to his knocking.

What if she wasn't home? He hadn't allowed himself to consider the possibility during his rush to get there, and he had no idea where else he could search for her. He didn't have a clue how the woman spent her time, but considering where her daughter spent hers, Mrs. Everdeen might have been difficult to find.

He was saved from his worrying when a haggard blonde woman opened the door. She was tense, and her eyes were narrowed as she took in his presence.

"Is it Prim?" she asked before Peeta could speak. "She should have been home already. Did something happen? Where's Katniss?"

"Prim wasn't feeling well, so we took her to Madge's house to rest. Katniss is with her, but we think you need to see her."

Mrs. Everdeen gave a short nod and motioned for him to wait. She left the door open as she hurried around the house. Though he felt guilty, Peeta couldn't help but glance at what was right in front of him. He could see most of the house from the front doorstep Two beds were pushed against a far wall, allowing the living room to double as the bedroom.

He had never had privacy in his own family home, but at least he'd had a room with his brothers.

Mrs. Everdeen retrieved a small cloth bag from a cupboard. As soon as she had it in hand, she hurried past Peeta without a word, pulling the door shut behind her. She didn't look at him as they hurried through the Seam, leading him down the most direct route to the merchant quarter this time.

Her bag was clutched to her chest as if it were a child's teddy bear.

"How was she?" Mrs. Everdeen asked once they were nearing the mayor's house.

"It was hard for her to walk and talk. There was a lot of coughing."

He was at a loss for what else to say, as he didn't know what symptoms Mrs. Everdeen was looking for. While he'd gathered that something was up with Prim's lungs, he didn't have a clue what it was. Most of the lung conditions he'd heard of were a result of miners inhaling toxic fumes in the mines. Prim had never stepped foot underground.

Mrs. Everdeen didn't give him time to share anything more though. She was running through town, ignoring the looks people gave her as she brushed past. Peeta would pause long enough to apologize, but it did nothing to calm people's annoyance.

Mrs. Everdeen didn't knock on the mayor's front door either. Peeta wondered idly if anyone from the street would see this and notify the peacekeepers.

Prim was propped up with some pillows when she saw her mother. Despite her current condition, she smiled.

"Hi, Mom."

Her words led to coughing. Mrs. Everdeen hardly acknowledged them as she sat her bag down on the floor and began inspecting Prim for the signs that the rest of them didn't know to look for.

Mrs. Undersee had re-entered the room while Peeta was gone. She sat quietly in a chair, one arm propped on the arm rest, allowing her hand to support the weight of her head. Madge hovered around her, whispering quick requests that she go back to bed only to find said requests ignored.

The woman's eyes widened when Mrs. Everdeen entered as if she hadn't been expecting it. She watched as the other woman looked over her daughter. For the first time, it appeared that some of her pain had gone away or was at least been assuaged.

She stared at Mrs. Everdeen as if she were a ghost.

"It's another case of pneumonia," Mrs. Everdeen informed Prim and, by extension, the room as a whole. "A severe one, too, it looks like. You're going to need a lot of rest. Katniss will explain to the principal why you're not at school tomorrow."

"But I had plans with Gil tomorrow," Prim whined.

"I'm sorry," Mrs. Everdeen said, "but you can't be going out like this. Not when you can't walk home. Give it time. You'll get better faster."

"Could Gil come visit you instead?" Peeta suggested, startling the Everdeens. "Then you could still see your friend but relax too."

Katniss was less than thrilled with the suggestion. Gil had a habit of getting in your face when talking that had always unnerved her, but then, she had planned to spend the next day in the woods anyway. The excitement on Prim's face at the idea was enough to keep her from protesting.

"Can he?" she asked, glancing between Katniss and her mother. "Could he bring his chicken too?"

"Chickens aren't meant to be in a house," Katniss complained. "That thing would poop everywhere, and I'm sure Buttercup would eat him for a snack."

"Buttercup would never."

There was no use convincing her of the contrary, so Katniss held her tongue.

"Maybe the chicken can come in for a few minutes," Mrs. Everdeen allowed. "But Gil can stay for longer."

"Thank you," Prim replied, settling back onto the pillows looking more at ease. "Thank you, Peeta."

Katniss watched Peeta carefully as he sat down in the chair next to the couch to ask Prim about Gil and how long they'd known each other. Prim replied eagerly, and Peeta listened even when her coughing interrupted what she had to say.

Mrs. Everdeen had done what was needed to satisfy herself, and she had moved to Mrs. Undersee's chair, stooping down to lay a hand on the shoulder of the woman who had hunched over, clutching at her head with both hands.

She startled when Mrs. Everdeen touched her. She raised her head to look at Mrs. Everdeen with wide eyes.

"Do you still have morphling?" Mrs. Everdeen asked the woman in a gentle voice that Katniss had only heard her use with her own children before.

Mrs. Undersee nodded and glanced at the tin sitting on a small table beside her.

"I've taken the recommended dose for today," she said in a shaky voice. "With the commotion, it all came back anyway."

Mrs. Everdeen nodded, concern knitting her eyebrows together.

"Do you need help getting back to bed?"

Mrs. Undersee stared at her a moment before nodding. She allowed Mrs. Everdeen to guide her out of the room. Madge watched them go with as much wonderment as Katniss.

"Dad said they were friends once," she said once the women were gone.

Katniss raised an eyebrow.

"Who?"

"Our moms. When Dad heard that I'd started eating lunch with you at school, he mentioned that your mom was my mom's best friend when they were kids. I'd forgotten about it though. I've never seen them speak to each other."

"Neither have I," Katniss said. "I've only seen your mother on a stage."

Not wanting to discuss her mother anymore, Katniss returned to Prim, who had closed her eyes and appeared to be napping. Before she reached her, her mother had returned to the room, swiping at her eyes.

"We should get her home," she said to Katniss. "Thank you, Madge, for letting her come here, but she'd be better off at home where I can watch her."

"You're welcome. You could all three stay if you wanted, though. We have the space, and I'm sure my parents won't mind."

"No," Katniss and her mother said at once.

Mrs. Everdeen was the only one to continue.

"It's nice of you to offer, but it'll be easier on us if we're at home."

Madge looked like she might argue for a moment, but she nodded in resignation.

Katniss glanced at Peeta, who had gone back to standing off to the side to stay out of everyone else's way.

"I can help you get there," he said, startling Mrs. Everdeen, who had bent over her bag under the pretext of replacing the items she'd brought with her.

"Thank you," she replied before Katniss could answer otherwise. "That's very kind of you, Mr. Mellark."

Peeta's eyes widened when Mrs. Everdeen called him by his last name.

"It's no problem," he said, stepping forward and picking up Mrs. Everdeen's bag for her before handing it to her. "Prim's a sweet girl. I want to make sure she gets home safely."

The appraising look Mrs. Everdeen gave him made him shift on his feet.

"Are you sure she can make it?" he asked.

Prim had dozed off, and she looked more peaceful than she had earlier when they'd been struggling to get her as far as Madge's house. The walk to the Everdeen household was at least ten times as far.

"She has to," Katniss snapped. "Unless you can get ahold of a car, what other option is there?"

Peeta thought for a moment before he sighed.

"Let's get to it then," he said.


	3. Chapter 3

Mrs. Everdeen hurried in front of them on the way to the Seam. She kept glancing back as if surprised at how far behind they were, but her anxiety kept her going before they had caught up with her.

Katniss kept her eyes ahead, glancing at Prim occasionally to check on her but never at Peeta. Eventually, though, the silence had stretched for too long, and Peeta couldn't keep himself from speaking.

"I wonder if we'll to get home early enough to watch tonight's Hunger Games recap."

No response.

"It's not like I enjoy watching it, but the last thing any of us needs is a peacekeeper finding us outside and reporting us. Of all the things to get in trouble for, not staring at a television screen is not how I want to go down."

Katniss allowed only a small grunt in reply, but Prim offered him a small smile. He smiled back, thankful that his attempt at conversation hadn't completely fallen through.

The year's games were still in their early stages. The initial bloodbath at the Cornucopia had been two days previously, and only one person had died since then. An unusually slow start. During the last recap, one of the Careers had begun hunting the youngest of the tributes. Tonight, they would find out what had become of the Career's quest.

"The games," Prim said, "aren't fun. I don't like them."

Peeta gave her a woeful smile.

"Neither do I," he assured her. "It's hard to understand people who do."

Prim gave a short hum of agreement, but she didn't waste more of her breath on speaking. Every twenty steps or so, they would have to pause for longer than they had walked to let her regain her energy. Throughout all of it, Peeta only spoke to ask Prim how she was or if she needed anything. Katniss did the same.

Though he knew he shouldn't, Peeta couldn't stop himself from glancing over Prim's head at Katniss time and time again as they walked. She had to have felt his gaze, but she steadfastly avoided looking in his direction.

He could take a hint, and he couldn't say that he was surprised. This was precisely why he'd never been able to work up the courage to speak to Katniss in the past.

Eventually, the Everdeens' house came into view. Prim let out a gasp of relief when she saw it.

"We'll get you lying down, and I bet you won't have to get back up until you absolutely want to," Peeta assured her.

"Probably longer than that," she managed to get out.

Katniss shot her a reproachful look, but Prim was oblivious to it as she hurried as best she could to the front door, taking Katniss and Peeta along with her.

It wasn't until they'd gotten Prim ensconced in blankets on one of the beds, that Peeta was able to take a closer look at the house.

Despite the worn nature of the place, it felt comfortable. Everything was as clean as its age would allow, and someone had placed a jar of cut flowers on the dining table.

Mrs. Everdeen was busy hovering around Prim and making sure she had everything she needed. For a few moments, Katniss watched. Prim refused her mother's offers of food and protested even her mother's insistence that she down an entire glass of water.

Peeta took a hesitant step towards the door, wondering if he should make his exit without calling attention to himself. It would have been the wiser choice, but he couldn't resist the opportunity to speak with Katniss again. He'd heard her voice more in the past couple of hours than he had in years, and it was too tempting to hear it once more.

But it wasn't Katniss that he spoke to first. Instead, he caught Prim's eye.

"I hope you feel better soon," he told her. Turning to Katniss, he continued, "I'll see you at school tomorrow?"

Katniss gave a slight nod, though her attention was taken up by Prim.

"Bye," he said, ostensibly to the entire room.

Prim offered him a tired wave while Mrs. Everdeen gave him a small smile that didn't reach her eyes as she patted a wet rag against Prim's forehead.

He turned to leave, resigning himself to receiving no acknowledgement from Katniss, but she surprised him by following him out the door and tugging it closed, leaving them alone except for a group of children playing at the other end of the street.

"Thank you," Katniss said, looking at the ground instead of him.

Her shoulders straightened after she'd said the words aloud.

"You didn't have to do any of that," she continued. "It was unnecessary, but...I do appreciate it."

"Of course," he said. "Prim's a nice girl. I'm sorry that she isn't well right now."

"Who here is well?" Katniss asked sharply.

She glanced at the children down the street. Peeta kept his eyes on her, but he knew what details of the children's appearances she was zeroing in on, the ones that were always there in Twelve: the bones that were too visible to be healthy, the way many of the children were shorter than Capitol children of the same age. They'd both seen it their entire lives, though Peeta knew he'd never experienced it as intimately as Katniss had living in the Seam.

Peeta hadn't had nutritious, well-rounded meals in his life, but he had had enough calories to build some muscle. There were few in the Seam who had been afforded that luxury. They were strong, but you often couldn't tell by looking at their bodies.

When he had been very young, Peeta had believed that the lower-numbered districts, such as One and Two, sent older tributes into the arena year after year.

He looked at Katniss. Her attention wasn't on the kids anymore. She was looking into the distance, not focused on anything but what was running through her own mind.

"I guess I need to go," Peeta said.

Katniss didn't look at him as she nodded her head. She said a quick, "Goodbye," before disappearing into the house and leaving Peeta to go wherever he wished except for after her.


	4. Chapter 4

Katniss made it to their lunch table before Madge did.

The food on her tray was the most frequent lunch the school served them. The kids around her chattered on the same as always, not aware of what had transpired in Katniss' life the day before.

That was the way she wanted it. Madge and Peeta had seen too much. It made her uncomfortable, even if Gale had thought that was ridiculous when she'd confided in him later that evening.

A tray slid onto the table across from Katniss. She looked up to find Madge smiling at her. There was a hint of sympathy there that was not typical and that caused Katniss to look down at her beans instead of risking more eye contact.

"How isー"

Katniss heard the sound of another tray sliding against the table's surface and looked up to see Peeta settling in beside Madge, who was watching him with raised eyebrows.

Katniss had thought he might approach her at the end of the day to ask a few questions, but she hadn't expected this. She glanced at his friends, who were oblivious to his absence as they continued laughing amongst themselves.

Peeta followed her gaze and shrugged.

"I talk to them every day," he said. "I was worried about Prim."

"Me too," Madge said, leaning forward on her elbows.

She had recovered from Peeta's appearance quicker than Katniss had. It took her several moments before she realized they were expecting a response from her.

"She's fine."

That was a more than adequate answer for two people who hardly knew her sister. Katniss took a bite of her beans, trying to ignore, at first, that the other two were still looking at her expectantly.

"She's resting," she said once she'd swallowed.

She had no idea what more information they could want. Talking about how Prim had coughed the whole night through seemed like too much to share in the school cafeteria.

"I'm glad," Madge said. "She deserves it after everything the other day. No one should have to get out of bed for at least a week after something like that."

Peeta nodded in agreement.

"It was rough," he said, "but I'm sure your mom will have her up and moving around in no time."

Katniss shrugged when he looked to her for confirmation. She didn't feel like explaining that this was frequent. Sure, Prim would get better, but then it would come back.

"She will," Katniss said.

They looked satisfied with the answer, relieved to know that a little girl wouldn't be suffering as much in a week or so's time. It almost made Katniss reveal the truth to them in a fit of anger. She might not have been able to stop herself if it had only been Madge across from her.

Peeta had shown her kindness before, but it had been from a distance. Him actually speaking to her left her feeling distrustful. It made her feel as if he wanted something in return, and she had no desire to get wrapped up in a situation where she owed him anything. She couldn't afford it.

Their attention was easily swayed. Peeta turned to Madge and began to talk about something that was, to them, far more serious than Prim's current condition.

"I guess you both watched the games last night."

Madge hummed in agreement, but Katniss could only look at him as if he were an idiot. The games were required viewing during the evenings. Even in class, the teachers would devote time to staring at the screens. That very well might have been the only reason they had a summer semester. They learned more about how to murder innocents than anything else.

History classes that compared the current games to those of the past. Science lessons that explained the specifics of the arena. English classes devoted to writing essays about which tribute you favored to win, backed up with evidence from their past performance.

Suggesting one hadn't watched the nightly recap was stupid at best. There was only one answer that was legal.

"That girl from Eight," Peeta said. "Josie, I believe her name was. That was harsh."

"Terrible." Madge groaned. "I saw parts of the human body that I never wanted to see."

"That was the one that got gutted," Katniss said slowly.

Her mom and Prim had hid their eyes during it, while Katniss had watched one of the tributes from Two do to the girl what Katniss had done to wild game she had caught over the years. Though it had unnerved her, Katniss hadn't been able to stop staring at the undeniable proof that humans really were animals when it came down to it.

Madge shuddered, dropping her fork to her tray.

"I can't eat anymore," she complained, covering her mouth with the back of her hand. "Now I keep seeing it in my head again."

"Sorry," Katniss said, though she wasn't sure if she should be apologizing. She wasn't the one who had brought it up.

"How do you do it?" Madge asked, prompting a confused look from Katniss. "Talk about it so calmly," she clarified. "I can barely even watch it happen, yet you just don't seem to care."

"I care," Katniss shot back. "It's disgusting, but we've been watching it our entire lives." She shrugged. "I don't know how else I'm supposed to feel about it. It happened. Getting worked up about it won't do anything to help anyone."

She didn't look at the other two, sure they'd be looking at her the same way Prim had looked at her after hearing Katniss' response to a similar question once. Katniss had felt ashamed to see the ambivalence in Prim's eyes, and though she cared far less about Peeta's and Madge's opinions of her, she didn't want a reminder.

For a few moments, it was quiet. Then Peeta spoke.

"You'd make it in the games."

Katniss was glaring at him before she could think better of it.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Peeta held up his hands in surrender.

"Nothing," he said, sounding as if he regretted his choice of words. "But we all know what you do. The hunting."

He lowered his voice as if someone would overhear and report them to a peacekeeper. Katniss wondered if he'd ever spoken out loud about breaking the law, even if it was someone else who had actually broken it.

"You'd make it in the games," he continued. "If there's one person in District 12 who I'd bet money on winning, it'd be you."

"Not much competition," Katniss muttered.

No one in Twelve had lasted much longer than the Cornucopia bloodbath since Haymitch Abernathy had won, and that had been before they were born. Katniss had a hard time believing many of the stories they'd been told about Haymitch's games were even true when she'd seen him stumbling around Twelve, barely coherent most of the time, her whole life. One might have even blamed him, at least partially, for Twelve's helpless tributes over the past couple of decades. The parents of many of the dead tributes certainly did.

"Maybe not," Madge said, "but Peeta's right. You'd stand a chance."

"Thanks," Katniss said with a roll of her eyes. "I'll try to take that as a compliment."

She didn't like to spend time thinking about whether or not she'd be capable of driving an arrow through another human's heart if she needed to.

Peeta and Madge fell silent. Madge mirrored Katniss by looking down at her tray, but Peeta kept his eyes on Katniss, observing the way her shoulders slumped over and she picked at her food.

He couldn't tell her that what he'd meant to say was that she was strong, so he changed the topic to the only thing his frazzled mind could come up with.

"Haymitch Abernathy came in the bakery the other day."

He regretted saying it as soon as Katniss scowled at him. Of course neither she nor Madge would care about the comings and goings of Haymitch Abernathy. No one did.

"It was right before the games," Peeta trudged on, not wanting to admit defeat. "He was drunk, obviously, and he came in and bought tessarae bread. Dad tried to get him to buy something more expensive, but he just wanted the tessarae bread. He said it had been years since he'd had it, and he wanted something new. Told us to just give him the damn bread and stop bothering him."

Katniss sniffed in annoyance. The richest person in District 12 had deigned tessarae bread worthy of being part of his meal. Katniss knew how the bakery had come to possess tessarae bread. Everyone did. That bread wasn't made from grain given to the Mellark children. Mr. Mellark was known to buy tessarae grain from children for more than it was worth. There were rumors that he'd pay in sweets along with the cash. It was common knowledge that Mrs. Mellark should never be approached. She'd chased a young girl out of the bakery with a broomstick once.

Selling the grain or anything made from it was illegal, but the bakery was hardly making a profit from it. It was kept hidden, under the counter, when they had it. The peacekeepers didn't ask questions.

The bell rang signalling the end of lunch. Katniss grabbed her tray and fled before either of them could speak to her again.

XXX

The TV was already on when Katniss arrived home from school. Prim was propped up on a pillow and watching it with the same look of faint disgust and fear that she usually wore during the Hunger Games. Their mother was at the table, sewing a rip in one of Katniss' shirts.

The only sounds were the familiar rustling of trees and underbrush that Katniss was used to from the woods, except it was coming from the TV.

Each year that there was an arena with a forest, Katniss was forced to watch tributes make mistakes that she knew would cost them. Few of them, she realized, had been in such an environment before. Eleven was the only district Katniss knew of that allowed anything resembling a forest to grow inside the district itself, and those were carefully maintained orchards, with short trees sitting in neat rows.

The tribute on screen was one of the tributes who had seemed especially ill prepared for the environment he was facing though. He was a large boy from District 4. From what Katniss had seen, the few trees in Four looked unlike anything Katniss had seen in the woods around Twelve or in that year's arena.

"How many have died today?" Katniss asked, setting her school bag on the table that sat in the middle of their kitchen space.

She had homework that consisted of answering some questions about District 2's industry because their female tribute was the current favorite to win in the Capitol. It wasn't anything that couldn't wait, if Katniss bothered to do it at all.

"Two," Prim replied. "Both boys. From Three and Ten."

Katniss tried to recall those two particular tributes. She couldn't remember the name of the boy from Ten. He must not have done anything remarkable.

The boy from Three had been planning something against the Careers who had been using him, but she supposed that hadn't worked out. His name might have started with an 'S', but Katniss wasn't sure.

The image on the screen changed as Katniss sat down. It was the girl from Eleven. Katniss remembered her name: Rue. She'd captured Katniss' attention when her reaping aired because of her similarity to Prim.

If Rue and Prim were put side by side, Katniss was sure they would be a match in size. That must have been what it was that drew Katniss to her. It was difficult, at times, to figure out what a tribute would be like outside of the arena, but Katniss got the impression that Rue and Prim had very different personalities and abilities. Prim certainly wouldn't have been able to scale trees with the ease that Rue did.

She must have worked in the orchards of District 11. There was no other way she could have navigated the treetops in a way that Katniss hadn't seen any other tribute manage.

Katniss had been trying her best to track Rue's movements throughout the games, but the girl wasn't a Capitol favorite, which meant the cameras often forgot about her for long lengths of time as they tracked the excitement.

She'd used her skills to her advantage, staying high in the trees where none of the other tributes were capable of getting to her. Even if they tried, the branches she perched on looked like they'd snap under the weight of someone any larger than herself.

Not once had she descended to hurt another tribute. Only to get food or water when needed.

"It looks like someone has their eye on the smallest of our tributes," Caesar Flickerman narrated, his voice alight with glee. "This goes to show you, folks: tributes can't stay hidden forever."

Katniss grimaced at the screen as the image changed from Rue to the boy from One.

"Where are the other Careers?" she asked.

Prim shrugged.

"They're still alive and together. I guess he thought he could take her himself."

Prim's voice sounded as upset by that as Katniss felt. The expression on the boy's face was one of thinly veiled rage directed at a young girl who had done nothing to him except been forced into the same arena.

The camera switched back to Rue, her eyes shining as they tracked the boy's movements. He was coming for her, but he didn't yet know where she was hiding. Rue had the advantage as she tracked him from her vantage point. Her best chance was staying still and observing.

Katniss' heart drummed in her chest. Never before had she felt concerned for a tribute whom she'd never met. It had never made sense to her how people in the Capitol became attached to people they'd only seen through a television screen. Rue, though, was different than the others, and Katniss felt bile rising in her throat as the boyーMarvel was what Flickerman was calling him in the narration that Katniss was hardly paying attention toーcame to a stop ten feet from Rue's tree.

"I know you're around here," he growled loud enough that he risked bringing another tribute upon him. "You can't hide forever, little bird." He laughed at the nickname. "That's what Glimmer calls you, you know? You're the only one we haven't seen since the Cornucopia. That has to end. This is the Hunger Games. You can't hide forever."

He fell quiet, and Flickerman took the opportunity to agree.

Rue did nothing but watch. Her face was devoid of emotion except for her wide eyes.

Marvel growled when there was no answer, as if he'd expected his idiotic tactics to work like magic. Rue not obeying his whims had him enraged. He kicked at a tree in his frustration, making enough noise that any tributes nearby certainly knew his location.

Rue leaned forward on her branch slowly enough that not a leaf rustled.

Katniss found herself leaning forward just as Rue was onscreen. There were a few tense moments as Marvel paced, eyes scanning the treetops. Rue had camouflaged herself magnificently, and Marvel began to wander in the opposite direction, still looking for her.

Once he was far enough away, Rue and Katniss both leaned back, letting out long exhales of relief.

"That was a close one, folks," Flickerman said as the camera tracked Marvel. "But rest assured, someone will find her eventually."

He gave a boisterous laugh. Katniss stood up and announced that she was going hunting. No one said anything as she disappeared out the door.


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: As a warning, there's a scene from the games shown again in this chapter, and it's more intense than in the last chapter. Expect death this time.**

It took several days, but eventually, Prim was well enough to attend school again. On the walk there, she was boisterous, relieved to have her freedom back even if it meant sitting in a classroom all day.

When Katniss met her outside the school building that afternoon, though, she was looking a lot more tired than she had been that morning. Katniss took her bag from her, throwing it over her own shoulder, and it was a sign of Prim's fatigue that she didn't protest the "babying" she was receiving.

"Will you make it home?" Katniss asked.

"I'll be fine," Prim said, taking a step forward to prove her point. "A nap would be nice though."

"You can nap as soon as we get home."

She put an arm around Prim's shoulders in case she became unable to support herself as they walked. It left both of them feeling better.

"If you'd let me go on a walk yesterday, I wouldn't be this tired now," Prim complained, sticking out her bottom lip in a pout.

"If you'd been walking around, you wouldn't have been well enough to go to school today."

"I agree with Katniss," said an amused voice to their left.

Katniss stiffened, twisting her neck around so quickly that a sharp pain shot down it and caused her to grimace. Peeta was standing several feet away, grinning at them. Well, he was grinning at Prim, Katniss noticed with relief.

"It's good to see you again," he said, giving Prim a tilt of the head in acknowledgement. "How are you feeling?"

"Good. Just tired. Laying in bed all day is boring."

"I'm sure it is. Good thing you don't have to anymore, huh?"

Prim nodded in agreement.

"Can you walk home with us?" she asked brightly.

It was quite a change from the pout she'd been exhibiting before Peeta had appeared.

Peeta glanced at Katniss, his smile wavering. She watched him, keeping her face blank, as Prim bobbed on her toes, hands clasped together in front of her. She wasn't surprised by Prim's offer, but she refused to offer Peeta any encouragement.

"That would be okay with me," Peeta said.

If Prim sensed the uncertainty in his voice, she chose to ignore it.

"Great," she said, bouncing forward and wrapping her small hand around Peeta's forearm to tug him down the street.

"You really want to walk all the way to the Seam?" Katniss asked. "Don't you have work to do?"

She knew Peeta went to work at the bakery after school. She'd seen him in there on every occasion that Prim had goaded her into staring at the sweets before heading home.

"Not today. I was supposed to have wrestling practice, but it was cancelled."

He didn't elaborate, but Katniss knew why it had been cancelled. The girl that had been reaped from Twelve had wrestled alongside and against Peeta. It hadn't saved her when she'd been thrown into the arena.

"Great," Prim said, oblivious to the whole story.

It hadn't been something the tribute had considered worthy of sharing with Panem during her interview, and Katniss certainly hadn't bothered to mention it.

The transition from the merchant quarter to the Seam required walking along a road lined with scattered trees and little else. Katniss sometimes wondered why no one had bothered to build along this road, but she thought that perhaps everyone liked having such a noticeable gap between the merchants and everyone else.

"Doing okay?" Peeta asked Prim as they walked.

She brushed away the concern, maintaining a bounce to her step. Though she no longer had ahold of Peeta, she'd stayed close to his side, all but ignoring Katniss as she walked behind them.

"I'm fine," Prim said. "Really. It's not like it's never happened before. I'm over it."

From behind, Katniss noticed Peeta pause in his step, but he quickly recovered.

"Happened before?" he repeated.

"Sure," Prim said. "Mom says my lungs need special care, but there's not much we can do to stop it happening. When they start to hurt, Mom and Katniss make me rest a few days. But I'm fine," she added, noticing Peeta's unease. "I'm used to it. It's happened since I was little."

Peeta glanced back at Katniss, who continued to keep her expression devoid of any emotion. It was true that Prim's lungs acting up had been a routine since she was much younger. There was no point telling Peeta that, yes, it might have been more serious than Prim was letting on. They didn't really know if it was. There were no doctors in Twelve, and their mother didn't have prior experience with anything like it.

When Katniss shrugged at him, Peeta's eyes widened. Katniss looked towards the ground, watching her feet move one in front of the other.

Peeta looked as if he wanted to ask another question, but he held it in. Prim was looking more tired than she had been when they'd set off from school, but she hadn't lost her cheerfulness. He couldn't bring himself to ask more questions about her illness.

Just as he was trying to think of a clever way to change the topic, Prim scurried away from his side to bend over what little grass lined the dirt road. When she stood up and turned back around, she had a dandelion clasped in her hand.

"Here," she said, holding it out to Peeta. "Thank you for helping me the other day."

It took a second before Peeta reached out to accept the offered flower.

"You're welcome. I was happy to help, and I really am glad you're okay."

Prim gave a short nod and continued on her way. Peeta looked down at the flower, not realizing at first that Katniss had stayed to watch him instead of following Prim. He glanced up, and they made direct eye contact for the first time since the schoolyard.

"She likes giving gifts to people," Katniss said, "but she doesn't get to do it much. Most people wouldn't care about getting a dandelion."

"Why's that?" Peeta asked. "Dandelions are great flowers. One of the few plants that'll easily grow inside the fence, and you can eat them. Sounds pretty awesome to me."

A look of uncertainty passed over his features.

"You can eat them, can't you?"

Katniss looked at him strangely for a second. She had to bite back a grin that was threatening to take control of her lips.

"Yes, you can eat them," she said.

It was only then that Peeta realized Katniss and Prim had eaten dandelions before. Though Peeta might have benefited from the inclusion of more greens in his diet, he had never tried the plant. He couldn't imagine his mother allowing them to eat anything they'd collected from the dirt themselves. His face flushed, and he lowered the hand that was holding the flower to his side, almost hiding it from Katniss' view.

Prim had disappeared down the road, leaving the two of them alone. Katniss' eyes were focused on the direction that her sister had gone in, but she wasn't sure how to extract herself from her conversation with Peeta. With others, she would have just left, not caring if it looked rude.

"I'm glad she's doing better," he said.

"So am I."

Peeta nodded, and they stood there for several seconds in uncomfortable silence.

"I guess I need to get back. Mom will be expecting me in the bakery."

Katniss didn't say anything in response, only gave a short nod, as she turned away from him and began walking towards the Seam.

"Katniss," Peeta called, unable to stop himself, "if you or Prim need help again, you can ask me. Just so you know."

Katniss glanced back at him, posture stiff. She watched him for a second and then gave a slight jerk of the head.

"Thanks," she said, not exactly sounding grateful, and hurried down the road, refusing to glance back at Peeta and see the kindness in his eyes that unnerved her.

XXX

The day's recap was coming to its end. Several Careers were still alive, as was the girl from Seven and the boy from Five. Thresh had been the latest to die, confronted by Marvel as the latter searched for Rue with increasing ferocity.

Marvel, as with many Careers, took visible pleasure in killing, and Rue, as the youngest in the arena, seemed to be the ultimate prize in his eyes. He has begun to annoy the other Careers with his singular focus, but with so few tributes left, the others were beginning to agree that she was a priority.

Marvel and Glimmer worked well as a pair, but it still took them an agonizingly long time to come across Rue.

The young girl remained perched in the trees, only descending when she needed food or water. Perhaps because the Capitol enjoyed Marvel's frenzied search for her, they had yet to use any tactics to draw her out.

Rue was as quiet as always, but Marvel's eyes had been fine tuned from days spent staring up into treetops. He saw her this time. The stomach twisting smirk on his face alerted Panem to it before he'd said a word.

"There she is," he grunted to Glimmer, who scanned the canopy herself but had a far harder time picking Rue out amongst the branches and leaves. Her eyes snapped to any small sway of a twig but still couldn't find what they were looking for.

The girl in question remained silent. Her eyes shined as the cameras zoomed in on her face. She may have been spotted, but she wasn't giving up hope that, if she was still enough, Marvel would be convinced he had imagined her and move on. Her camouflage was intact, after all, and one might have come to believe they really were looking at nothing but more foliage.

Marvel wasn't discouraged though. He turned his head to the side, spit on the ground, and hurried to the foot of the tree Rue was perched in.

Katniss' heart hammered in her chest. She couldn't tear her eyes from the screen to see how her mother or Prim were reacting. In that moment, she was in the arena, feeling Rue's anxiety.

It was unlike anything she had experienced before. She knew that some, such as Prim, often connected to what was happening to the tributes in this way. As far as Katniss could tell, it was this exact reaction that made the Capitol citizens love the games so much. It had always confused Katniss, and having felt it for the first time, she was more confused about why anyone would want to feel this way.

She was going to be sick.

Marvel scrambled against the bark of the tree, unable to find hand or foot holds. Based on the footage of District 1 that Katniss had seen, there weren't many trees. Of all the districts, One looked the most like the Capitol: buildings upon buildings with little space between them. They had mines like District 12, yet those mines were unrecognizable to those from Katniss' district.

You entered buildings before descending into mines in One. No one cared enough to put a building on top of a coal mine.

Marvel was determined. It was the lone positive quality Katniss would have ascribed to him. Throughout the games, he had never given up, and he wasn't planning to when he was close to his ultimate glory.

Rue wasn't trying to hide anymore, but she had nowhere to go. She remained silent, frozen. The branch she sat on was a thin one, able to support her weight only if she was careful about her movements. It would be difficult, from that vantage point, for her to reach another tree without descending part of the tree she was currently in first. Marvel, for all his inexperience, understood that much, and it propelled him upwards with enthusiasm.

"I told you I'd get you," he muttered to himself as he struggled to climb. The effort was exerting him physically in a way that Katniss hadn't seen anything else achieve.

"Oh, I see her!" Glimmer exclaimed.

She'd come to stand at the foot of the tree as well, but she made no attempt to follow Marvel up the tree, content to let him make a fool of himself. A minute passed of Marvel attempting to climb, yet he hadn't made it more than a few feet off the ground.

"Get down," Glimmer urged him.

She was pacing, eyes scanning their surroundings for possible threats.

"So close," Marvel muttered instead of listening to her.

"You're not going to make it up there," Glimmer said. "Even if you could climb, those branches won't hold your weight. She's a third of your size."

"Watch me," Marvel replied as he scraped his foot against the bark, pieces of it crumbling and falling to the ground instead of holding his weight. "She's right there."

Glimmer rolled her eyes. When Marvel died, it would be at her hands. The Careers always turned on their district partner eventually. It was only a matter of when.

"You're not thinking," Glimmer snapped. "What have I told you about rushing into," the Capitol censors concealed her language, "like this? There are other ways to get her."

"Like what?"

Marvel had managed to reach a low-lying branch, and he draped himself over it as he tried to regain his energy.

Glimmer's smile turned predatory as she directed her gaze towards Rue, looking right at the girl as she spoke.

"A fire," she said as if she were speaking of the weather. "Trees burn. So do little girls."

Marvel's smirk mirrored Glimmer's, and he laughed even as the branch he was on dug into his stomach.

"Hear that, little girl? A fire," he said.

He was amused for several seconds before he realized he was stuck in the tree. He muttered a few choice words and began maneuvering himself so he was sitting on the branch instead of draped over it. He almost fell several times, and there was a true hint of fear when he glanced at the ground.

It wasn't that high up. He would have survived the fall, albeit with a broken limb that would have put him at a huge disadvantage.

Glimmer grunted in irritation.

"Jump," she told him.

Marvel's eyes widened a fraction before narrowing at Glimmer.

"You may not care if I live or die, but I do."

He looked at the trunk of the tree, trying to figure out how to get a good grip on it without sliding down uncontrollably. He reached for it, wrapping his arms around it as best he could, and as soon as he launched his lower half off the branch, he went sliding down the length of the trunk, landing in a heap on the forest floor, shaken but physically fine aside from scraps on his palms.

Rue spoke for the first time, her voice strong.

"You could have jumped. If you'd hung on with both hands, swung, and jumped, you should have landed on your feet, and it wouldn't have hurt as much. At your height, the drop would've only been a few feet."

Marvel sat up, wiping dirt from his chest, and glared at her. She hadn't done herself any favors with the taunt, but it didn't matter. The Careers had her cornered, and they weren't going to let her go. There was no appealing to their better natures. Better natures got you killed in the Hunger Games.

"I got down perfectly fine in my own way, didn't I?"

Rue didn't respond, which angered Marvel further. He took a menacing step towards the tree before Glimmer grabbed a handful of his shirt and tugged him back with enough force that he stumbled.

She handed him a tinder bundle and a flint starter.

Crouching down to the ground, Marvel was all smiles. He set the tinder bundle at the foot of the tree and laid some small twigs on top before rubbing the flint and igniting it. Glimmer carried over larger sticks, laying them gently on top of the embers.

"Your time's running out," Marvel remarked, looking up at Rue.

The firelight was reflected in her pupils, though it wasn't yet that large.

They'd started the fire close to the trunk of the tree, but it would be awhile before it grew large enough to do any real damage.

"Guard the tree," Marvel snapped at Glimmer, though she was already doing exactly that. "Make sure she doesn't come down while she can still run off."

Rue was searching through her small knapsack for something to use as a weapon, but she came up empty-handed. Sponsors didn't favor little girls who stayed hidden in trees. She held some berries she had collected for food and a small flask of water. After a moment of hesitation, she opened the flask and poured what water was left directly over the flames.

Marvel cursed, jumping back to avoid getting hit by what little of the water made it to the ground. He threw terrible names at Rue, things so vulgar the Capitol didn't deem them appropriate for the rest of Panem to hear, but the fire, though diminished, had grown large enough that it continued to burn. Marvel and Glimmer added more wood.

"Only the strongest can win," Marvel said with a laugh. "Your kind aren't meant to make it out of these arenas alive. You're the prey that the strong hunt to prove themselves."

"If you think I'm weak, then killing me isn't impressive, is it?" Rue shot back.

Her voice was trembling, but Marvel was too angered by her words to take pride in the way his actions had shaken her.

"I'll show you impressive," he growled.

He stooped over the fire, stoking it with the same ferocity he'd shown in his hunt for Rue. The trunk of the tree began to burn. Rue would fall due to a limb breaking long before the flames engulfed her on her branch.

"You don't have to do this," Rue pleaded, desperation overtaking her.

Marvel and Glimmer laughed.

"What do you expect?" Glimmer asked. "This is the Hunger Games, sweetheart. We _do_ have to do this. It's you or us."

"Only because you're doing what the Capitol's told you to do."

Katniss' breath quickened. Being near death had made Rue fearless. If there had been hope of her miraculously being saved, the Capitol would never allow it after this.

"The Capitol puts us in here and tells us to kill each other, so we do it because we don't want to die. But what if we didn't?"

"You'd still die," Marvel said with a roll of his eyes. "That's how this works."

"How many of us could the Capitol kill on their own before their citizens got mad, huh? You don't think it would ruin everything?"

Katniss couldn't bear to look at the screen any longer. Her eyes roved around the room, trying to settle on something calming. Prim's mouth hung open, and her mother's lips were pressed thin, her knuckles white where her hands were clasped in her lap.

"I can't believe it," Prim whispered.

Katniss wouldn't have heard her if her attention had still been focused on what was happening on screen.

Miraculously, the Capitol hadn't shifted away from the scene. Probably because they knew the anger that would erupt in the Capitol if they lost the opportunity to see one of the most anticipated deaths of the year.

Rue had given up on playing the game, but Glimmer and Marvel hadn't, and they were doing a fine job of meeting Capitol expectations. Their viciousness was the Capitol's greatest hope of countering Rue's dangerous words, and both were eager to milk the opportunity for all the favor it was worth.

"Someone's feeling desperate," Marvel cackled. "Fear makes you say the stupidest things, but you're not going to trick me. We both know you would kill me if you were given the chance. Pacifism is for people who know they'd lose a fight. That's always how it's been. There's no changing how the world works."

"You won't be happy," Rue said. "No one put in this arena will ever be happy again. If you make it out, you'll realize it sooner or later. I know you will."

Before Marvel or Glimmer could respond, Rue was letting go of her branch and plunging into the flames. Her suicide when she was already in her final moments shocked the Careers, who, for several long moments, could do nothing but stare in horror at her bent body as it was engulfed in flames.

She'd gone headfirst, and the cannon sounded long before the flames themselves would have killed her.

Out of the corner of her eye, Katniss saw Prim raise three fingers in the customary farewell of District 12. It was a pointless gesture, seen only by the three of them, but Katniss found herself mirroring the gesture.

"I wish I'd known her," Prim whispered.

XXX

Years of watching the games had never made Katniss fear her own woods. There were no Capitol horrors in the woods of Twelve unless you counted the mockingjays. While they held their own sorts of dangers, like mountain lions or coyotes, none of them were daunting to Katniss as long as she held her bow in her hands.

Rue's death, though, had filled her with a sense of dread she couldn't explain and that she was terrified of voicing aloud, even to Gale.

"I thought I'd seen the worst," Gale told her the day after Rue's death.

They'd perched themselves on a fallen log to rest for a few minutes after several hours of steady hunting, and of course, talk had turned to the Hunger Games as it often did during the summer.

"But I hadn't," Gale continued. "That was the worst."

Katniss gave a grunt of agreement but couldn't find it in herself to voice her horror further. Images of the night before were vivid in her mind, and trying to assign words to what she had seen felt like a useless act. Rue was gone just like countless others before her. One of the Careers was likely to be crowned victor later that night. There had only been three of them standing as of that morning.

When the games ended, Rue's death would either be part of the victor's highlight reel or forgotten altogether.

"That had to've affected people," Gale continued, plucking the feathers of the bird he had shot down not long before they'd decided to rest. "Her words, what she said, no one's ever been brave enough to say something like that in the arena. And she was twelve. People have to care."

Katniss shrugged.

"Maybe they will for a little while, but countless people have died in the games, Gale. Plenty of them were twelve. None of those deaths made a difference."

"It's not her death," Gale said, "or maybe it is, but it's more about her death after she said what she said, you know? That's what makes her special. The Capitol heard what she said. Everyone in Panem heard it."

Katniss frowned, watching the clouds travel across the sky as she considered Gale's words.

"The Capitol knows what happens in the arena, and they love caring about the tributes and victors. That never changes anything either. Rue saying that stuff probably made her exciting to them. I bet they have some craze where they 'honor' her by plastering her picture everywhere, but you know that things like that will just make them enjoy the games more. They'll be dying to see if someone can top Rue's performance next year."

"In the Capitol, yes. The districts won't feel that way."

Gale was plucking his bird quicker as he went on.

"People can use that; _we_ can use that. If enough people in the districts took Rue's words seriously, then who's to say they won't decide to do something? Eventually, the Capitol has to listen. Maybe it will be through words, maybe not. But, if we're loud enough, they have to hear us."

Katniss felt the same uneasy churning in her stomach that she'd felt as Rue died. She hadn't had much of a breakfast that morning, but she wished she hadn't eaten at all.

"A war? No. We don't need something like that. Wars don't make things better. They make them worse. People die in wars."

Gale paused from plucking his bird, turning his gaze to Katniss. He contemplated his words before speaking.

"People die in wars," he agreed. "But we also send kids to die every year, and a ton more die because they don't have enough food. If we don't fight, then that keeps happening. If we fight, that can end. We sacrifice lives now to save more in the future. Is that not worth it?"

If it hadn't been for Prim, Katniss could have gotten sucked in by Gale's rhetoric, but it wasn't only herself she was thinking about. Katniss had done everything in her power to make sure Prim's chances of being reaped were as slim as possible. The chance may have still been there, but Katniss did what she could to assure herself that it was too statistically improbable to happen.

A war meant that careful planning was for nothing; a war meant Prim's chances of dying increased.

"We can't fight the Capitol," Katniss said. She couldn't hold back the slight sense of disgust she felt. "We have nothing in District 12, Gale. If we start an uprising, the Capitol will flatten us to the ground before we get started. No one would survive. Twelve would be nothing more than a second District 13."

Gale's jaw clenched in frustration.

"Twelve can't fight on its own," Gale allowed, "but I'm not talking about Twelve against the Capitol. I'm talking about every single district allying against the Capitol. The same thing we should have done decades ago."

Katniss shook her head. Feeling as if she were vibrating from the effort needed to disguise how distressed the conversation made her feel, she rose from her spot on the log. Her grip on her bow had turned her knuckles to white.

"You sat through the same history classes I did," she said. "You know this exact talk is why we have the Hunger Games in the first place. If we fight, we'll lose, and then what? What would they come up with to punish us if the games weren't enough?"

Before he could speak, Katniss turned away from him.

"Come on," she said over her shoulder. "It'll be dark soon. We should see if we can catch anything else."

She heard Gale throw his bird into his sack. Once he started following her, he was silent, a skill they had both perfected over their years of hunting. Katniss wouldn't have known he was there if it weren't for the innate awareness she'd developed of Gale's presence.

They killed three more squirrels before they turned back for Twelve. Not once did Gale mention a possible rebellion again.

Gale had something else on his mind too, though, which led him to speak up once they'd slipped under the fence and were back in Twelve.

"I saw you and Prim with that Mellark kid the other day."

Katniss felt her cheeks flush. A new experience. She'd never been embarrassed around Gale before, and she wasn't sure why Peeta walking with her and Prim would elicit such a response, especially when she had never asked for him to tag along.

"I told you he appeared out of nowhere that day Prim couldn't make it home. He just showed up again," Katniss snapped, shoulders rigid. "He said he was worried about Prim and wanted to make it sure she made it home okay."

Gale raised his eyebrows and leaned away from her.

"Okay," he said slowly. "I just thought it was odd that he walked all the way out to the Seam to turn right back around and take the same path again. Wasn't he supposed to be working?"

"His wrestling practice was canceled," she said with a shrug.

Gale put the pieces together as quickly as Katniss had. The tribute who'd died had been in his year at school. Katniss had never bothered to ask if Gale had known the girl.

"I see," Gale said, and the tone of his voice rankled Katniss for reasons she couldn't make sense of.

"He's strange," she said, something almost like venom in her voice. "The day after everything at the mayor's house, he sat with Madge and me at lunch. Said he wanted to know how Prim was doing. I told him, but then he stayed there. He talked about stuff with Madge. She told me that he's the only merchant kid that talks to her."

She paused, a thought that had been in her thoughts coming back to her again.

"I think she might like him," she said in the same tone of voice one might use to admit that you had made a mistake after denying it several times.

Gale grunted. It was common knowledge that Madge isolated herself from everyone. The merchant kids in his own grade often whispered that she must have a dark secret, likely one that she'd learned from her father who had access to the Capitol that no one else in Twelve, save for Cray, could dream of having. One girl Gale knew had shared a plan to befriend Madge to find out the lurid details but had been convinced otherwise when she'd seen Gale's disgust at the idea.

"Mellark seems like a good guy," Gale admitted. "I'm sure he's nice to Madge. And to Prim."

"She gave him a dandelion, and he thanked her for it."

The second it was out of her mouth, Katniss didn't know why she had said it.

"Prim?" Gale asked.

Katniss nodded.

"What did you expect him to do?" Gale asked in amusement. "Stomp on it?"

Truthfully, Katniss had no idea what she had expected him to do. It didn't matter what Peeta did; somehow, it left her feeling confused.

"I didn't expect him to care," she said. "It was a random flower she picked from the side of the road. Most people wouldn't have cared."

Part of her was annoyed that Gale didn't find it as odd as she did.

"Prim has that effect on people. She could have given him entrails and gotten a genuine 'thank you.'"

That might have been true, so why, then, was Katniss bothered by what had happened?

"Prim let it out of the bag that this wasn't the first time something like that had happened to her, and I think it has him worried she'll need help again."

Gale sighed. They were close to the Hob, but Gale drew up short and turned to face her.

"Look, I'll meet you and Prim outside of school tomorrow if you want. I'm not shooing Mellark off like a stray cat, but if having an excuse for him to not walk home with you would make you feel better, you can have it."

For a second, Katniss wanted to protest, to tell Gale that she was perfectly capable of walking home with Prim by herself. But Gale wasn't telling her that she wasn't.

XXX

"It looks like it's going to be pretty bad," Gale said, looking up at the overcast sky as they stood in front of the school. "I don't think we should hunt today. That's a severe storm coming, and Mom will want help comforting Posey."

Posey had a deep fear of thunderstorms, and when Gale had come home to a frantic little sister demanding to know if he was okay, he'd sworn that he'd never go into the woods during a storm again.

"That's fine," Katniss said a bit reluctantly. "We have enough food to last if it storms for a few days."

Gale nodded absentmindedly, eyes still on the clouds.

"So do we, but I don't think we'll be waiting that long. Those clouds are moving quickly."

Gale had always been better at reading the sky than Katniss. She knew when rain was coming, and she could tell the difference between a rain cloud and a storm cloud, but that was about it. Gale always knew how bad a storm would be and how long it would last before the rain began.

"Hi," came a voice from behind them, the one word drawn out and uncertain.

Katniss turned around quicker than Gale. Between the clouds and Gale's presence, she hadn't believed Peeta would show up.

Katniss tried to respond with a simple, "Hi," but all that came out was a grunt.

The two boys exchanged nods of the head, their eyes lingering on each other as if they were determining what the other one's presence was about. Katniss turned away from them to avoid being suffocated under the weight of her discomfort, and her stomach soared in relief when she saw Prim hurrying towards them, an excited smile on her face.

Usually, when she looked like that, it was because she had exciting news to share with Katniss. This time, though, that wasn't the case. She hurried straight for Peeta. Katniss was ashamed of the twist of jealousy in her stomach.

"Peeta!"

Peeta's smile was almost as bright as Prim's.

"You're looking much better today," he remarked.

Prim bounced on her toes. There was color to her cheeks that she had lacked several days ago.

"I feel great," Prim said, puffing out her chest in pride. "Are you walking home with us?"

"Of course, if that's what you want."

"Yes!"

Prim let out a short, happy laugh, bobbing on her toes.

"It's going to storm," Katniss said slowly.

Her words drew Peeta's attention to her, and he smiled nervously.

"A little water won't do me any harm."

Katniss glanced at Gale, who gave a little shrug when Peeta's attention was drawn by Prim asking if he'd had a good day at school.

"It won't," Gale mouthed to Katniss, who found herself glaring back.

Without looking at her sister or Peeta, Katniss turned on her heel and began following the path to the Seam. Gale's steps were silent as he stayed by her side, but Katniss could hear each step Peeta and Prim took behind her, even with their constant chatting.

Their classmates buzzed around them, with many of the younger kids lingering as they waited for someone to fetch them. A group of merchant kids, some of whom were in Katniss and Peeta's year, had formed their usual pack in front of the grocery store. While she refused to look directly at them, Katniss knew they were tracking them as they passed. If Peeta noticed, he didn't say anything about it.

They made it to the fringes of the merchant quarter before Gale felt the need to say something.

"So, you're friends with Madge Undersee?"

Katniss raised an eyebrow, but Gale was looking over his shoulder, not at her. Of all the questions Gale could have asked Peeta, that was not the one she had expected to hear.

"Uh, yeah," Peeta said, startled at being pulled from his conversation with Prim. "Why do you ask?"

"No reason. I was just under the impression that none of the merchant kids talked to her."

Katniss was confused, but she also recognized the look Gale shot Peeta over his shoulder. He was sizing him up like he did deer, trying to figure out where to hit to cause the most damage.

"They don't." Peeta sounded regretful. "Just me. She's always been quiet. When we were younger, she'd hang around with us but not say much. Then she stopped showing up at all. Everyone else figured she didn't want anything to do with us and stopped trying. But I figured she must be lonely, so I made sure to say hello whenever I saw her. That's it really."

Gale didn't have much to say in response. His shoulders relaxed, and he offered Peeta a slight grin, the closest thing to a smile he'd shown to him.

"Maybe she prefers talking to one person instead of a whole crowd," Gale pointed out. "Some people are like that."

He threw a pointed look at Katniss, who stared in a different direction. Prim started giggling before she could hide her mouth behind her palm.

"Yeah, they are," Peeta said with uncertainty. "Yesterday, she came to the bakery. It was nice."

The Everdeen household came into view, and relief surged through Katniss' veins. When she turned around, it was to find Prim pouting at Peeta.

"Do you have to go?" she asked. "You could always come inside for awhile."

Peeta shook his head.

"I have to get back to the bakery. My mom's expecting me, and she won't be happy if I'm late."

Gale glanced at Katniss, but his expression was unreadable. Katniss had never told Gale what she'd seen Mrs. Mellark do that night with the bread, but Gale must have been aware of what Peeta's home life was like. The entire town knew of Mrs. Mellark unsavory behavior, even if Peeta did a great job of hiding any marks he received.

Prim, however, retained an innocence that prevented her from putting the dots together. She knew of Mrs. Mellark's anger but had never considered the possibility of physical violence being involved.

"She won't let you miss one day?"

"No."

And though Peeta's voice was regretful, it was firm. He had to get back to the bakery.

Prim looked devastated, and Peeta stooped to her eye level and smiled.

"Tomorrow, my dad's in charge. How about I bring you a cookie?"

Prim's eyes went wide. All traces of her pout were gone quicker than they'd appeared.

"Thank you," she said in one exhale, rushing forward to hug him before he could leave.

Katniss' throat tightened as she watched. It took a second for Peeta to wrap his arms around Prim, patting her lightly on the back.

"You're welcome," he said.

Katniss glanced at Gale, wishing she could say something to him without the others hearing. His narrowed eyes were watching the scene before them. When he felt Katniss' eyes on him, he glanced at her and shrugged.

Peeta gently tugged Prim's arms off of him. He gave the whole group a short wave, said goodbye, and began walking towards town without looking at them again. Prim scurried inside, humming to herself. Katniss didn't follow, unable to stop watching Peeta's retreating form until he rounded a corner.

Gale stayed by her side, watching Peeta retreat just as she was with a frown creasing his forehead.

"That was interesting," he commented once Peeta had disappeared.

"Interesting how?" Katniss asked.

"I've never told you this, but sometimes I talk to Madge too."

Katniss turned to look at Gale, analyzing him as if she would be able to find a lie. She realized, in that split second, that she didn't know much about Gale's relationships at school. Though she knew he had friends amongst his classmates, she didn't know their names. If Gale had spoken about them to her before, she'd promptly forgotten about it. She was sure she'd have remembered Madge's name if it had come up.

"Madge Undersee?" she clarified, though there was no one else named Madge in Twelve to the best of her knowledge. "When would you have done that?"

She had been sitting with Madge at lunch for years and the thought of neither of her only two friends mentioning their own friendship to her felt more like betrayal than she wanted to admit.

"Yes, Madge Undersee," Gale replied, doing his best to sound like he was teasing, though there was tension around his eyes and mouth that betrayed his true feelings. "I ran into her one day a few months ago, and I knew that she was your friend. I figured I'd say hello. She was nervous, but she was nice. We haven't talked much, but I asked her about Peeta the other day after hearing what you had to say. She called him the nicest person she's ever met. I don't think the Capitol could pry anything less than praise out of her when it comes to Peeta."

"Madge is nice. She'd never say something bad about anyone."

"Maybe," Gale said with a shrug. "But you can tell when a comment like that is a lie, and she wasn't exaggerating. All I did was bring him up, and she couldn't stop talking about how great he is."

Katniss couldn't understand why that irritated her. She should have been relieved that the boy who had taken a sudden interest in her sister's wellbeing had a flawless reputation amongst those who knew him, but instead, it annoyed her.

"And your point?" she snapped at Gale as a rumble of thunder echoed in the sky.

Gale glanced at the clouds. As he did so, Katniss felt a raindrop hit her skin. Several more followed.

"We should get inside," Gale remarked, but he didn't ignore Katniss' question. "There's no reason not to be nice to him. None that I can see anyway. He's trying to befriend you, not tear you limb from limb like a wolf."

"Befriend me?" Katniss asked. "It's Prim he's interested in, not me."

Gale raised an eyebrow and smirked.

"Katniss, he sat with you at lunch that day, and he kept glancing at you hoping you'd join the conversation when we were walking with him just now."

Katniss' eyes widened. She hadn't noticed.

"Besides, you're his age. Prim, no matter how great she is, is twelve."

She adjusted her stance and looked away from Gale. The rain was coming down with more force. If they stayed out much longer, their clothes would be soaked through.

"I'm going home," Gale said.

He didn't immediately leave when he said it, giving Katniss time to protest.

She didn't, letting him go without a word, but she stayed standing on her family's doorstep instead of going inside. Since starting school, she'd been able to count her friends on one hand.

Even her and Madge's long term arrangement had never been Madge trying to 'befriend' her. Katniss had seen their arrangement as a matter of convenience more than anything else. Before she'd offered to help with Prim, Katniss had been unsure that Madge qualified as a friend in the strictest sense.

People didn't try to befriend Katniss Everdeen. Not except Gale, and he hadn't actually tried. Circumstances had pushed them together. The same couldn't be said for Peeta. He kept barging into her life of his own free will.


	6. Chapter 6

Several days passed, and Peeta continued to walk with them after school. Sometimes he brought Prim cookies or even flowers, usually dandelions easily procured within the confines of Twelve. Gale was around each day too, and even, once or twice, Gale's younger brothers, who had become nearly as taken with Peeta was Prim.

"He's not that bad," Gale said one day.

They were in the woods, like usual, sharing a snack of tessarae bread before they continued their hunt. Katniss hadn't meant to interrupt the peaceful moment with talk of Peeta, but she had difficulty forgetting about him.

"He's a nice guy," Gale stressed at Katniss' scoff.

"It's not about whether or not he's a nice guy. I'm not saying he isn't. But he's a merchant kid. What do we have in common with him?"

"Prim seems to have found enough to want him around, and speaking from my own experience, it's not that hard to talk to merchant kids, Katniss. Don't forget, your mom was one too before she married your dad. It didn't stop them from falling in love. Surely you could be friends with one."

Katniss ripped off a piece of bread with her teeth, using more force than was necessary.

"What am I supposed to talk about with him then?"

Gale sighed.

"I don't know, Katniss. You can try anything, see if he's interested in it. Usually, you go with what feels natural in the moment. Maybe something happened in class; maybe the Capitol did something shitty; or maybe you need to rely on the weather because you can't think of anything else. Most people have no problem with it."

He was trying to tease her, but Katniss didn't bother to feign amusement. Gale had never understood why she didn't talk to most people unless there was something that needed to be said. Maybe he couldn't take her seriously because he never saw how isolated she kept herself at school.

Gale knew the most important parts of her, but he didn't understand the parts of her that were all most people got to see.

"But we have nothing to talk about," she reiterated.

Gale sighed. He was getting frustrated with her in that way he sometimes did when she insisted on something he didn't agree with and couldn't be swayed. Gale could get a conversation started with a stranger instantly about anything. Katniss could haggle over the price of a buck, but she couldn't talk about the weather with Peeta without feeling like she was putting on a facade.

"If you let him," Gale said, "I'm sure Peeta could start a conversation himself. Then you'd just need to go with the flow."

That didn't help anything. She would still be at a loss for a response, but she didn't say as much to Gale, not wanting to hear him dismiss her worries. Instead, she swallowed the last of her bread, stood up, and prodded Gale until he agreed to restart their hunt. That was what they did best together.

XXX

It took a couple months before Prim got sick again, and despite his continued walks with them at least a few times a week, Peeta wasn't there when it happened.

Prim laid in bed, ensconced in the four pillows they owned, and though she asked if Katniss thought Peeta would visit, Katniss couldn't bring herself to go get the boy her sister kept bringing up. He'd like to know, she supposed, but she couldn't find it in herself to seek him out at the bakery.

Eventually, though, he heard the news, and Katniss had the sneaking suspicion that it was Gale who had been responsible. He began showing up once a day after school to visit, and Katniss did her best to be in the woods until he had left. She needed to hunt, after all.

The bakery left Peeta with limited time, so it was easy to predict his visits. What Katniss couldn't have predicted was Mrs. Undersee frantically knocking on their door one afternoon, clutching the straps of a bag she had thrown over her shoulder.

Madge had known about Prim since Peeta had, leaving Katniss with the same hunch of Gale's responsibility, and she'd been adamant about getting daily updates on Prim's condition, though she never came to visit. Katniss supposed she shouldn't have been surprised Mrs. Undersee had found out too, but she had a feeling that Madge hadn't given her mother her blessing before the woman had set for the Seam.

The girl stood several feet behind the woman and was asking her to calm down, hand gripping her shoulder, when Mrs. Everdeen tugged open the door.

Katniss stood behind her own mother much like Madge did hers, and the two girls caught each other's eyes before Mrs. Undersee surged forward, knocking her daughter's hand away and blocking the two teenagers' views of each other.

"Sylvia," Mrs. Undersee greeted her old friend.

She gripped Mrs. Everdeen's shoulders, her fingers white from the pressure they exerted. There was relief in her voice yet so much anxiety too.

"I heard about the girl," she said, looking around Mrs. Everdeen to find Prim, who had sat up in bed and was watching Mrs. Undersee with wide eyes. "Is she okay? _Are_ you okay?"

Prim was startled at being addressed directly, but she gave a short nod and said, "I'm okay," in a weak voice.

Her words didn't do much to calm the frantic woman. Mrs. Undersee wasn't helped by the fact that it looked like she'd thrown on a dressing gown and hurried outside without bothering to brush her sleep mussed hair.

Madge stepped inside the house, closing the door behind her, and she stepped forward to put a soft hand on her mother's back, whispering in her ear low enough that the others couldn't make out what was being said.

Mrs. Undersee nodded along to her daughter's words, but she wasn't listening to them. Her gaze had shifted to the bag that was strung over her shoulder. She began rummaging through it before Madge had finished speaking and pulled out the same tin that Katniss recognized from last time.

The woman's hands shook as she held her prized possession. Its contents rattled against its metal sides.

"Morphling," Mrs. Undersee said with the same reverent tone she'd used to speak of the drug before. "I know you didn't have to give it to her last time, but—"

"Reagan, no," Mrs. Everdeen said, not unkindly. "It's not bad enough for that."

Mrs. Undersee's face fell. She looked down at the tin as she took a moment to decide what to do next. Then her eyes roved over the room, never staying anywhere for long. Her legs collapsed underneath her, making Madge and Mrs. Everdeen hurry forward to catch her. They deposited her on the edge of the bed that sat across from Prim.

"I don't want to give it up," the woman moaned.

Discomfort pricked Katniss' skin. Her eyes were drawn to Mrs. Undersee, but staring felt rude. She forced herself to look away, but in her nervousness, her eyes flicked from one object to another, nonstop.

Knowing her mother would never give such a strong painkiller to Prim, she retreated to a corner of the room, placing herself enough out of sight that she felt more comfortable watching the woman closely. For the first time, she felt a wave of sympathy for Madge. Since she'd first learned about her friend's mother, she'd assumed their mothers were equally useless, but Mrs. Undersee was scaring her in a way that was very different from the nearly comatose mother Katniss had dealt with.

"I don't want her to be like me," Mrs. Undersee continued. She clutched the tin to her chest like a security blanket, the drug comforting her even without moving through her veins. "I don't. The pain, it's always there. Always. I need it. _Need_ it. She shouldn't be like this, but I want to help. I want to help."

"I know, Reagan. I know."

Mrs. Everdeen stepped forward and placed a strong, comforting hand on Mrs. Undersee's shoulder. Madge stood several steps away, watching in abject horror. Despite many harrowing moments, she'd never had to deal with her mother breaking down in front of the entire family of one of her only friends.

Tears began running down Mrs. Undersee's face, but she didn't sob. Her eyes had zeroed in on the tin, and it held off the worst of the crying. Her fingers traced the design decorating the lid, colorful swirls with no particular meaning.

"I need it," she repeated.

Madge's frown deepened, and she glanced at Katniss, who averted her gaze.

"Sometimes I can't get it," the woman whispered as if she were admitting a secret. "My doctor's in Two, but they watch him. All their rules, you know. I get morphling when Ron makes them happy, and sometimes he doesn't. He doesn't care that it means I don't get my medicine. I can live without it, see, just in pain. Some things are more important."

She opened the tin. From across the room, Katniss couldn't see what was inside, but Mrs. Undersee shook it, and it was clear from the rattling that little of its contents remained.

"No more until they're happy," Mrs. Undersee muttered. "So Prim couldn't get more anyway, see. Neither could I."

She cringed, raising a hand to press on her forehead.

"Oh, no," Madge said, rushing forward to grab her mom before Mrs. Everdeen could.

"Is it an aura?" Mrs. Everdeen asked, gripping Mrs. Undersee's hands.

Mrs. Undersee didn't speak. She nodded listlessly, looking at her old friend with haunted eyes.

"They always mean the pain is coming."

She looked into the tin, warring with herself over whether or not to take the medicine. The others knew which decision she would make.

"Mom, we need to get you home," Madge urged. "You'll never make it back with a migraine."

She reached one arm around her mom's back and tried to lift her from her armpits like one might a small child. Mrs. Undersee didn't provide much help but also didn't put up a fight.

"I'm sorry about everything," Madge said to the Everdeens. "I need to get her home before the migraine hits. She, well…" She hesitated before continuing. "It's not just the migraine. Not really. Migraine's hurt her neck, and she'll start crying about Maysilee's death when she feels it."

Madge took a shallow breath, glancing at her mother, who had gained a new sense of awareness at the mention of the name 'Maysilee.'

Mrs. Everdeen nodded, reaching out to pat Madge on the hand.

"Do you need help?" she asked.

Madge was quick to shake her head, ushering her mother to the door and out of the house without another glance back.

As soon as they were gone, Prim asked in a shaky voice, "Who was Maysilee?"

Mrs. Everdeen turned away from the door, unshed tears in her eyes. Without looking at her daughters, she answered.

"Maysilee Donner was Mrs. Undersee's sister. She was a tribute in the same games as Haymitch Abernathy."

And that was it. She made it clear the subject was over by turning to the kitchen, grabbing a glass, and filling it with water to give to Prim, who took it without protest despite never having requested it.

XXX

It was after that visit from Mrs. Undersee that Mrs. Everdeen began making regular trips to the Undersee house. Katniss never asked why or what her mother could possibly be talking about with the other woman.

Each time she returned from a visit, her eyes were rimmed in red, and Katniss got the distinct impression there was more of a personal connection between her mother and Maysilee Donner than she'd let on.

Twelve was small enough that it was impossible to not be connected to a former tribute in some way. If it wasn't your family member, then it was someone you knew from school or a friend of a friend.

Prim got better again, or at least as 'better' as she ever got. She was never as healthy as other kids her age, and they never knew when her lungs would act up. But she was going to school and doing the things she usually did on the day it happened.

Mrs. Everdeen hadn't gone into town for several days and was as unsuspecting of the knock as her daughters.

Katniss was the one who opened the door, expecting someone who needed medical help from her mother. Those were the only people who knocked on their door, save Gale, and that knock hadn't been Gale's.

A man who was not from District 12 stood on the other side of the door.

If the doctor's jacket hadn't given him away, then his general manner would have. He exuded a sense of authority that was different from that of the peacekeepers, one that wasn't maintained through fear.

This man had been well fed for most, if not his entire, life. He had a glow about him that Katniss had once thought was merely a product of makeup but that she realized, looking at this man, must be a side effect of good nutrition.

"Hello," he said, choosing to ignore Katniss' shock if he had noticed it.

Behind her, Katniss heard her mother fumble with the dishes she had been washing in the sink, letting them fall into the basin with a loud clang, as she noticed the man.

"I'm Dr. Adamas," the man said, holding out a hand for Katniss to shake.

She looked at it suspiciously for a second. Shaking hands was as uncommon in Twelve as meeting new people. Curiosity made her take it. His hand gripped hers firmly, but it wasn't an act of aggression as much as it was how the man always shook hands. Katniss had to tug several times before he let go of her, and she found her eyes narrowing as the man took a step into the house without having been invited in.

He saw Mrs. Everdeen and zeroed in on her. He took a step forward and held out his hand as he had for Katniss, continuing to introduce himself.

"I'm Reagan Undersee's doctor from District 2. Twice a year, time permitting, I come out to visit her. It does little good. I can't be blamed for her current condition. There would be better treatments in different circumstances. Even in Two, her case would be a tricky one for me to handle due to my limitations. Morphling, I can prescribe to anyone. Other drugs are Capitol only.

"What I can do without much interference is diagnose. There aren't many restrictions on that."

His eyes found Prim and narrowed as he analyzed her as best he could from across the room. He was already making hypotheses in his mind.

"Mrs. Undersee has asked me to examine your daughter. She will pay the bill, of course."

He was only looking at Mrs. Everdeen, but when the woman shared a look with her oldest daughter, Dr. Adamas looked between them, one eyebrow raised.

"I can't guarantee that I can help," he said. "To be up front, I probably can't unless you're interested in going the morphling route. They hand that out freely to people who can pay, but I've been told you're not interested in mere pain management."

He added the last part quickly, attuned to the anger building in Katniss.

"The only other thing I can give you is knowledge of what you're dealing with. Young girls don't take to bed ill repeatedly unless there's a larger problem, but I'm sure you already knew that. I might be able to make some recommendations of things you can do at home that will offer some relief. But I'll have to examine her to get a better idea of what we're dealing with."

Katniss clenched her jaw, determined not to give the strange man an answer one way or another. It would have been one thing if they were Capitol citizens being examined by a Capitol doctor. Doctors there let people do a number of strange things, but rarely did they do something that resulted in illness or death. There were rumors that morphling was actually harder for Capitol citizens to get ahold of than the rest of Panem.

They weren't Capitol citizens, though, and Dr. Adamas was a District 2 doctor. The only people Katniss had met from Two were Twelve's peacekeeping force, and she mistrusted them more than she distrusted anyone from outside the Capitol.

Katniss watched her mom carefully, taking in the way the woman uneasily looked from person to person, unsure of what she was meant to do.

"Mrs. Undersee tells me you know understand medicine yourself," Dr. Adamas said.

The tone of his voice had turned flattering once he'd realized he would have to work harder than he had expected to get a chance to look at Prim. He took a step closer to Mrs. Everdeen and bowed his head as if honored to be in the presence of another medical practitioner.

"She said you're the closest thing to a doctor that Twelve has. I admire that. In fact, it's why I agreed to visit you when I could lose my license to practice for doing so."

Mrs. Everdeen backed several steps away from the man, her frown deepening.

"I'm not a doctor."

"No," Dr. Adamas said with a slight shake of his head. "You're not. The Capitol has seen to that with their medical school restrictions. To tell the truth, it's remarkable that _I'm_ a doctor. There are only a dozen of us in Two, and you know, I'm sure, that our population is larger than Twelve's. I'm the only one who isn't the child of doc—"

"No matter how many people you have," Katniss remarked, "a dozen is a hell of a lot better than none."

The doctor smiled at her for the first time since he'd entered the house.

"It is," he said. "We have the doctors we have because of the generosity of the Capitol and the important role we play in keeping Panem running smoothly."

There was a wry sarcasm to his voice that sparked respect in Katniss. It made him intriguing to her in a way merely being from Two failed to do.

"When I was young, I showed a propensity for science. Many of my peers were being encouraged to play sports and train in the hopes they would become Careers or, if that didn't pan out, Peacekeepers. Instead, my parents kept me at home studying the principles of biology after school hours. It paid off. I was the first student in more than ten years to be chosen from Two to study at medical school in the Capitol."

"And what do you give the Capitol in return for their generosity?" Katniss asked.

Dr. Adamas' smile morphed into a smirk.

"Healthy Careers, of course," he returned. "They're the bulk of my clientele and the only real payment I manage to get for my services. There's a particularly nice payout when your client becomes a Victor, but even some of the more promising trainees can get the Capitol to foot their medical bills."

Katniss' face was blank as she watched him, but Prim's jaw had dropped open. Though she knew little about the behind-the-scenes of the Career system in Two, Katniss couldn't say she was surprised by such a thing. It was yet another piece to the puzzle as to why some of the districts kept pumping out Careers.

"So you make your money on Careers and then come out to the other districts as a charity project?"

"No, Miss Everdeen, I get paid to help Mrs. Undersee too. Understand, the Capitol doesn't much care how she is for most of the year, but on select occasions, one has to have a mayor's spouse who's at least capable of standing on stage and looking healthy. As long as she doesn't get too much of the morphling, she's capable of that."

Katniss felt bile sting at the back her throat.

"If she were a Victor, how would you treat her migraines?"

"Assuming she wasn't an addict intent on taking the drug despite the advice of her doctors, I would advise her to invest in a device that would stimulate the nerves in her neck and brain to stop the migraine. It's not a drug but a machine. It's rather straightforward and effective for most patients who have access to it. If that didn't work, we would discuss surgery to decompress her nerves. That typically works for any patients who don't have success with the device."

"And that would allow her to walk around and not have to worry about her migraines anymore?"

"If she responded to the treatments like most patients, then yes. There's always the chance that wouldn't be the case, of course. The human body is a strange thing, and far more unpredictable than your basic science classes have suggested."

Katniss watched him. He had been more forthcoming than she had expected.

Glancing at her mother, Katniss gave a slight nod, her silent approval of Doctor Aurelius inspecting Prim. The doctor sensed this for what it was, taking a step closer to his new patient but watching Katniss as he did so.

Prim was propped up in bed and didn't look as sick as she had the day before. Her latest illness had been relatively minor, and she was already more or less recovered. She would have been allowed out of bed the next day, though the unexpected doctor's visit might have flustered her mother enough to push for another day of bed rest.

"I have to admit," Doctor Adamas said as he pulled a chair up to Prim's bedside, "that I didn't come to Twelve ready to diagnose a lung condition, but I'm also used to working with limited equipment. Be prepared for a lot of breathing."

He gave Prim a gentle smile that was unlike anything he had shown so far, and Prim giggled. She was used to her mother listening to her lungs, but the idea of a real doctor doing so had her giddy. No one she knew had ever had the chance to be inspected by a real doctor.

For what felt like forever, Adamas listened to Prim's lungs. He listened in more ways that Katniss had thought it was possible to listen to someone breathe. She had no idea what new information he could be uncovering as he moved his stethoscope about and asked Prim to breathe yet again.

Eventually, he leaned back in the chair, tugging the stethoscope out of his ears.

"If we were in my office, I would perform a sweat test and a genetic test after that examination. As it is, I don't have the ability to perform either in Twelve. In Two, we have to send samples to the Capitol for any genetic testing, and I can't do that without the Capitol knowing whose DNA I swabbed."

He would have had to fight Katniss off before she'd let him take any DNA from Prim, let alone let him send that information to the Capitol where they could do whatever they pleased with it.

"Because of that, I'll do something very unprofessional. I'd like to talk to all of you more about Prim's symptoms and give you my best guess as to what's ailing her, but I have to caution that it won't be an official diagnosis without the tests."

He asked questions for more than half an hour, some that made sense and some that didn't. Even Mrs. Everdeen raised her eyebrows at a few of them, particularly those that pertained to Prim as an infant.

"My best guess is cystic fibrosis," Adamas said much later. "There are other conditions that manifest as frequent lung infections, but from the information you've given me, I most suspect that one."

"Cystic fibrosis," Mrs. Everdeen muttered to herself before speaking louder. "I'd considered it before, but I don't really know much about it."

She hesitated, looking distraught. Her knuckles were white as she gripped her hands together in her lap.

"There's nothing we can do for that here."

It wasn't a question. Mrs. Everdeen was already certain of it. Katniss didn't know anything about cystic fibrosis, but her mother's resignation wasn't a surprise. Few conditions could be treated adequately in Twelve.

Doctor Adamas had a crease in his forehead that hinted at his own frustration.

"No," he agreed, "there isn't much. Even in Two, most regular citizens would be told to manage their symptoms. The few that are better off would get help through various devices, mostly those that help remove fluid from the lungs. None of those treatments cure the disorder.

"Only those in the Capitol can receive treatments that have any chance of curing cystic fibrosis. Victors, of course, would likely be granted them as well, but I've never seen one with the condition. Parents with ill children aren't the parents foolish enough to sign their children up to be killed."

"What are our options then?" Katniss snapped. "Do you have anything, or have you made us talk to you for hours for no reason?"

Adamas leveled Katniss with an intense, penetrating gaze that left her feeling uncomfortable.

"I _do_ want to help, Miss Everdeen. While it is true that I can't provide your sister with the Capitol medicine that would provide the most benefit, I can teach you how to perform—"

Katniss didn't stay to listen. A sudden urge to move had come over her, and she was out the door before Adamas could finish his sentence.

 **A/N: An important note about the medical stuff: I tried to keep in mind both the fact that the Capitol's medicine would be more advanced than what we currently have and that Twelve would have trouble accessing even the level of treatment that's considered standard in many countries today. Because of that, there's a combination of futuristic, contemporary, and past medicine in the story.**

 **Also, apologies for a Peeta free chapter. He'll be back soon!**

 **Word count: 4,291**


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: Just a warning, this is another Peeta-less chapter.**

 **Word count: 931**

Katniss hated doctors.

She'd met exactly one in her life, and he had failed to convince her that they could make a difference. He had proven himself no better than the Capitol doctors she'd seen on TV—especially those trotted out during the games to talk about tributes' "health" as calculated by their perceived chances of winning—as being unworthy of the respect given to them without question.

Her mother may not have been a real doctor, but she knew more than anyone else in District 12. The suggestion that the doctor could recommend something her mother couldn't left Katniss' blood boiling. The only thing he could have provided them with that they didn't have was medicine. Katniss had known it was foolish to hope he would give them any of that.

The woods were a place of comfort for Katniss. She felt a sense of safety amongst the trees that Twelve rarely provided. The woods were her source of life, and signs of the Capitol's oppression were nonexistent as long as she stayed away from the fence and didn't think too hard about the mockingjays.

One thing the woods knew just as well as Twelve, though, was death. Few creatures in these woods were unaware of the danger. They all lived knowing that any moment might be their last.

Katniss wandered deep into the forest and threw herself under a random tree. The brush on the forest floor poked at her skin through her pants, but she couldn't bring herself to care.

It had been a long time since she'd been in the woods without Gale and been able to have time with only her thoughts for company.

She could hear birdsong and the occasional rustle caused by the animals moving through the plant growth. You could hear birds inside Twelve, but it wasn't the same. Here, the birds were in their element, and their songs reflected that as they filled the air.

For a few moments, Katniss didn't let herself think and only focused on their notes. But her mind drifted.

Prim had been sick for as long as Katniss could remember. When she was a baby, she had often wheezed and coughed. At first, Katniss hadn't found it strange. Prim was, after all, the first baby she'd been around. For all she knew, coughing and wheezing was just what babies did all the time, but it hadn't taken long for Katniss to catch on that her parents were worried about their youngest daughter. Even at the tender age of four, Katniss had felt their fear as if it were palpable, and it grew thicker each day as Prim's symptoms came back time and again despite her parents' best efforts.

There was nothing they could do. Nothing, at least, that made a permanent difference. They treated the coughs like they'd been taught by their own parents to treat coughs even when it became clear that the treatments weren't making any long term differences.

Soon, they were teaching Katniss to spot the signs that Prim needed help, a change from when they'd been adamant about not piling any worries onto their older daughter. Suddenly, they weren't pretending that everything was fine anymore.

Katniss often thought that she'd grown fiercely protective of Prim because of what had happened after their father's death, but she wondered if the roots of it didn't go back further than that. She'd never thought much of it, but her parents had positioned her to be Prim's protector. She'd never been resentful of it, having sensed how important of a job she was being entrusted with.

When someone was ill, though, there wasn't much protecting you could do. Finding food when there seemed to be none was one thing. Fighting off something microscopic that was attacking your little sister from the inside was something else entirely.

Katniss felt tears sting at her eyes, and she could no longer see the sense in fighting them off.

Most of the time, she viewed Prim's condition as a fact of life. They had learned to deal with it, and Prim was happier than most children her age in spite of it. Things were as fine as they were going to get.

Sometimes, though, Katniss would allow herself to think about what Prim was experiencing and would feel intense sadness she couldn't shake. No one in District 12 was healthy by Capitol standards, but Prim's went a little deeper. Even if Katniss had been able to give her more food, she wouldn't get completely better.

Without a good answer as to what was wrong, Katniss had never had a way of knowing what the final outcome for Prim would be. She'd always felt that, as long as Prim survived each bout of pneumonia, she would continue to live, on and on until she died of old age.

Amadas had as good as said that cystic fibrosis, if that was even what Prim had, was curable in the Capitol, but she hadn't stayed to hear his guesses about the life expectancy for those in Twelve. She didn't want to know the answer.

Reaching up to swipe at her eyes, Katniss allowed herself, if only for a moment, to consider that Prim's illness could kill her. It didn't do any good to dwell on the idea, especially when she wasn't sure how likely it was to come be true. Yet sometimes she couldn't get the dark thoughts to disappear before they consumed her.

This was one of those times. All she could do was close her eyes and wait for it to become bearable again.

 **A/N: I feel like I should give a heads up that Peeta won't appear again until chapter ten. We have some other stuff to deal with in chapters eight and nine. (Also, chapter nine is incredibly short, but we'll get to that later.)**


	8. Chapter 8

The sun was dipping below the horizon by the time Katniss made it back to the Seam. Her eyes stung, especially if she touched them, but it had been long enough since her tears had fallen that she comforted herself with the thought that any redness must be gone.

Coal miners were making their way home as well, passing Katniss without sparing her a second glance. She kept her head down, self-conscious that they would look at her and be able to tell that something was wrong.

She paused outside her family's house. Never before had she bolted like that, and it had been in the middle of an important conversation about Prim's health, one she would have liked to know the outcome of. She was always trying to be the strong one the family needed, but she'd done exactly what her mother had years ago and been unable to be there when Prim needed her.

Katniss pushed the door open but didn't step inside as she surveyed the scene. Adamas was gone, as she'd been sure he would be. Her mother and Prim were both there, with Prim propped up in bed listening to her mother read a story out of the book they'd each read a hundred and one times. It was an old, old text, written in Twelve before the rebellion that had been capable of passing the Capitol's inspection after the war.

The stories it held were of worlds where magic was practiced and lands were ruled by kings that were inevitably kinder rulers than Snow. Prim had spent much of her young life believing the world of the stories had once been real, and Katniss wondered if a part of her still did.

Mrs. Everdeen paused in her reading when she heard the door. She and Prim watched Katniss as she had stepped inside. Busying herself with unlacing her boots, she didn't look at either of them until there was nothing left for her to do.

She took a seat and clasped her hands together on the tabletop.

"Doctor Adamas is gone," she said slowly, her voice raspy both from crying and from not having used it in hours.

"He is," Mrs. Everdeen replied.

She stood from her chair next to Prim's bedside, laying the book on the table in front of Katniss. Surprising her eldest daughter, she touched Katniss gently on the shoulder. Katniss couldn't remember the last time she'd received physical affection from her mother. Even once she'd been roused from her misery after her husband's death, Mrs. Everdeen had remained more distant from Katniss than she had been before. Katniss had never been sure which of them kept it in place.

"He taught us some things before he left," Mrs. Everdeen continued.

"Mom's going to help me do physical therapy for my chest," Prim said, sounding as excited as she'd been when Katniss had brought home Lady and declared that Prim could keep her. "Doctor Adamas says it can help strengthen my lungs so they won't get sick as often maybe."

Mrs. Everdeen moved away from Katniss, taking the other chair at the table, and nodded.

"That is what he said," she allowed. "I've never known much about physical therapy," she continued. "Just about herbs and other remedies, but the science he explained makes sense. I think the exercises will help."

"What kind of exercises?" Katniss asked, pronouncing 'exercises' as if it were a foreign word she'd never heard before.

Exercise, to Katniss, was running laps at school while being yelled at to run faster. That sort of thing sounded unlikely to do much for Prim's lungs.

"He called it CPT," Prim said, leaning forward in her excitement to share the information. "People have been doing it to help with cystic fibrosis since before the Capitol had all its fancy treatments they use now. Doctor Adamas said it could make me get sick less, and it doesn't cost anything.

"He gave me all these ways I can sit or lay down to drain my lungs. Some of them look funny, though, so you can't make fun of me when I do them."

Katniss had never made fun of Prim for anything, but she nodded in assurance all the same.

"The other thing is called percussion and vibration, which is just Mom hitting me on the back to loosen the secretions. That's what Adamas called the stuff in my lungs. Secretions. He said there were tools for it, but since we don't have all that, a hand works better than nothing."

While Katniss appreciated that Adamas had helped boost Prim's spirits, she couldn't help but shoot her mother a skeptical glance. The woman shrugged, her own expression not one of a person entirely convinced.

"You're going to burp her like a baby?" Katniss asked.

Mrs. Everdeen sighed, but a quick protest from Prim cut off anything she might have had to say.

"It's not burping," Prim protested. "And it makes sense. If it's how you get air out of babies' stomachs, then why not do it to get stuff out of my lungs?"

It did make a certain amount of sense, but the fact that it was the best advice a Capitol-licensed doctor could provide did nothing to quell Katniss' earlier anger.

"He talked about some of the medicines we could use if we were able to get them," Mrs. Everdeen said in a voice so low that her words wouldn't be audible to Prim. "But that's not a possibility. Even if we had the money and could get ahold of the medicine in Twelve, we'd have to find a doctor able to write her a prescription without losing their job."

And they couldn't find what didn't exist. The last time there'd been a doctor licensed to practice in Twelve, Mrs. Everdeen hadn't been born. Those doctors had all earned their licenses before the rebellion. Since the war, the Capitol hadn't given approval for anyone from Twelve to study medicine in the Capitol and earn a license, citing a lack of demand in the district for the decision.

"Fine," Katniss said. "Whatever might work. At least it doesn't sound dangerous."

For all the miracles that medicine could provide, the Capitol provided plenty of entertainment that centered around horrors people encountered after going through medical procedures. It was these instances that left some in Twelve believing they were better off without the Capitol's medicine, but Katniss had always thought those people were just trying to make themselves feel better. That didn't mean she turned down Greasy Sae's supposed cure for the common cold—a soupy mixture with ingredients that Katniss had never been able to identify—that she swore had to work better than anything found in the Capitol.

No one in Twelve had any remedies that would help Prim though. Plenty had helped with the various bouts of pneumonia, but no one had been foolish enough to claim they could solve the underlying issue with the girl's lungs.

This was just another one of those treatments. It would hold of the pneumonia, but Prim's lungs would be the same as always.

"It'll help," Prim said softly. "I know it will."

 **A/N: Word count: 1,197**


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N: Welcome to the shortest chapter of the story. Peeta's in the next one. Word count: 324**

Prim and Mrs. Everdeen began the chest exercises with earnest that night. Holding onto her promise, Katniss tried very hard not to laugh as Prim draped herself over a pillow, allowing gravity to pull the secretions from her lungs. It was easier to stay stoic when Katniss reminded herself of why Prim was in the position.

Katniss watched closely, unable to escape the thought that one day she might be in charge of these exercises instead of their mother. It was, perhaps, an unnecessary precaution. If there was one thing her mother was good at, it was nursing people back to health. She handled it with an attentiveness that Katniss never could have managed.

But she had never been able to shake the distrust that her mother's depression had created inside of her. No matter what her mother had done and continued to do over the following years, Katniss retained the feeling that she needed to be ready to take over her mother's responsibilities. If another disaster happened that destroyed their mom again, someone had to help Prim, so Katniss pulled out a chair and watched, cataloging each step.

It didn't look hard, but she suspected that it was one of many tasks where doing it was far harder than it seemed to be to observers. Someone watching her shoot a rabbit might have assumed it easy, but they didn't see the mental calculations that had taken her years to perfect. It wasn't shooting an arrow blindly, and neither was this. Katniss could tell from the glint of concentration in her mother's eyes.

It was as if they were waiting for the chest exercises to lead to a miracle, for Prim to pop up and declare that she felt better than she ever had.

That didn't happen, but the smile didn't leave Prim's face either once she was finished. She still felt that this was her best chance, and Katniss hoped she was correct.


	10. Chapter 10

More than a month of regular chest exercises passed, and nothing changed. Prim claimed it was easier to breathe, but not having proof, Katniss couldn't help but wonder if Prim was fooling herself.

Peeta, who still often walked home with them, was always up for listening to Prim talk about the exercises. He'd assure her that they had to be helping if an actual doctor had recommended them, and Prim would look far happier than she did after Katniss' lukewarm admissions that maybe they were having an effect.

"I can't walk home with you," Peeta admitted one day, his brow furrowed with regret. "There are a few people coming in from the Capitol tomorrow to visit the mayor, and Mom wants all hands on deck to clean up the shop in case one of them decides to pay the bakery a visit."

Prim's face fell. One might have thought that Peeta had said he could never see her again.

"Can I help you clean the bakery?" she asked, stepping into Peeta's personal space with her hands clasped together beneath her chin.

Katniss' stomach twisted. Walks to the Seam were one thing. Sticking around the bakery all afternoon and, knowing Prim, into the evening was another thing.

"Prim, no," Katniss said, not without reluctance over upsetting the girl. "I have to hunt today. We can't stay in town."

It was the truth. She hadn't manage to get much the previous day, and if Peeta were telling the truth, it wouldn't be safe to sneak outside the fence while the Capitol people were in Twelve.

"I don't go out in the woods with you," Prim pointed out. "Why can't I stay at the bakery with Peeta while you hunt?"

The suggestion was an innocent one, but it made Katniss' blood run cold nonetheless.

She had never entrusted Prim into the care of anyone other than her mother and the teachers at school. The latter was only because it was the law, and the former...well, she didn't think she had much choice in the matter.

It wasn't Peeta who Katniss was worried about leaving Prim alone with though. He had proven himself rather harmless. No, it was Mrs. Mellark who worried Katniss. Peeta hadn't inherited his peaceful nature from his mother.

"We would appreciate an extra set of hands," Peeta said, watching Katniss as one might a bobcat they encountered in the woods when they couldn't tell if it was preparing to attack or flee. "We'll all be working hard, but my dad might pay you in cookies."

Though the last part was spoken towards Prim, he placed emphasis on "my dad," and Katniss knew what he was trying to tell her. That didn't mean that her stomach didn't seize up at the thought of leaving Prim in the same building as Mrs. Mellark when she wasn't nearby.

Prim stepped toward Katniss, hands clasped together in front of her chest just as they had been when she'd begged Peeta earlier.

"Please, Katniss. It'll be fine," she said, sounding confident of that.

Katniss could picture what would happen if she refused. Prim would pout and possibly not speak to her for a day or so. She was willing to face that when it was needed, but Peeta was still holding her attention. There was something in the way he looked at her that swayed her.

"Okay," she said quietly.

It took Prim a moment to realize that Katniss had agreed, but when she did, her face broke into a wide smile that almost made it worth it. While the young girl cheered, Katniss zeroed in on Peeta and tried to put on her sternest expression.

"She had better be okay," she threatened quietly enough that Prim, bouncing around in excitement, didn't overhear. "I mean it."

"Of course," he said, giving an exaggerated nod of the head. "I won't let anything happen to her."

He said it with conviction, and Katniss felt the knots in her stomach loosen. She wasn't sure what it was about Peeta Mellark that managed to convince her of things, but she believed him. She didn't respond to his promise except with a short nod of her head. Prim had finished her little dance and was watching them, eyes wide as she waited.

"Are we going?" she asked Peeta, bobbing on her toes.

Peeta gave her a smile before turning to look at Katniss one last time.

"If it would be easier, I could walk her home later too."

Prim pouted at the comment but instantly cheered when Katniss shook her head.

"We'll be back before dark. I'll pick her up then. I have to come to town anyway."

Peeta nodded and smiled at her. Katniss couldn't shake the feeling that those arrangements made him as happy as they made Prim. Maybe he really was getting tired of walking to and from the Seam.

She watched as Prim hurried to the bakery at Peeta's side. She was babbling as they went, and Peeta laughed at something she had said. It was odd how attached Prim was getting to Peeta. She liked most people, but she didn't angle to spend time with them like she was Peeta. Katniss didn't know what to make of it.

Forcing herself to do what needed to be done, she turned to head for the Seam. She'd gather up what hunting gear she kept at home, find Gale, and they'd head into the woods. Hunting would allow her to clear her mind. She couldn't worry about Prim when she was focused on the game.

XXX

Katniss felt her heart beating in her chest as she approached the bakery later that evening. Her sister sat on the front steps with Peeta beside her, and he spotted Katniss before Prim did. She could make out his smile from down the street. Her stomach churned uneasily.

Peeta said something to Prim, and the girl looked at Katniss, smiling and waving. Katniss raised her own hand in a short wave, telling herself that her nerves were stupid. Prim was fine. What else was there to be nervous about?

"Mr. Mellark gave me _two_ cookies," Prim said before Katniss had come to a stop in front of them. "They were delicious."

She said this last part to Peeta, who smiled sheepishly. Katniss had the distinct impression that she knew who'd baked the cookies that Prim had gotten to eat, but neither of them confirmed as much for her.

"Are you ready to go?" Katniss asked, already taking a step backwards.

"Can't we stay a little longer?" Prim asked, using the same wide-eyed expression she always used when she was asking for something.

Katniss froze. There was no good reason for them not to. Not really. She'd never been a stickler about Prim doing her homework, and it wasn't yet time for dinner. Few excuses were at Katniss' disposal.

Not for the first time, she wished she'd stayed in the woods for a bit longer. Everything was easier in the woods.

"Please, Katniss," Prim pleaded once more.

"Fine," she snapped. "We can stay for a few minutes. Mom wouldn't want us late to dinner."

Prim didn't take the warning seriously. She knew as well as Katniss did that any warnings that came from their mother meant little if Prim had been in Katniss' safekeeping.

Katniss took a seat on the steps beside Prim, feeling like she was intruding. She found herself shifting on the wooden step as she tried and failed to become comfortable.

Everyone was quiet at first. Katniss felt pressure to say something, anything, but there was nothing to say. Small talk was nothing but a waste of time, and there was little of importance for her to discuss with Peeta Mellark. Prim was happy, though, as she sat between her sister and newfound friend. Her smile was wide, and she kept swaying as if she were struggling to hold in her excitement.

"I helped wash the cases in the front where everything's stored," she told Katniss. "It wasn't hard, but it was a lot of fun."

Katniss bobbed her head once in acknowledgement. Prim would have found any job fun if she had the right person to talk to while doing it.

"She was a big help," Peeta said, leaning forward to look at Katniss around Prim. "She wanted to do more, but I told her she'd done more than enough already."

"It was easier for me to get all the way inside the cases than anyone else," Prim continued, smiling in satisfaction. "I'm small enough to hunch over inside them while I work. It made it easier."

Katniss got an image of Prim bent over as she stuck herself half inside in the cases that usually held breads and cakes, and she couldn't help but smirk at the image. She caught Peeta's eye and found a similar look on his own face. Katniss glanced away, her smirk falling.

"We should go," she said abruptly, standing from the steps. "Buttercup probably needs feeding."

She didn't like the small smile that Prim directed at her. They both knew Katniss could have cared less whether or not Buttercup was fed. Prim didn't argue though.

"Of course," she said.

Standing up, she tugged her backpack onto her shoulders and beamed at Peeta, able to look down at him while he remained sitting on the step.

"Bye, Peeta," she said, waving right in his face. "I have to go and feed my cat."

"Bye, Prim," he said with a grin. His eyes swiveled to Katniss. "Goodbye, Katniss."

Katniss grunted in return, raising one hand in a short wave of acknowledgement. She couldn't even look at his face. Without waiting for her sister, she headed in the direction of the Seam. Prim dawdled a few seconds longer, before she followed, catching up to Katniss at a jog.

"Peeta's great," Prim began, not paying attention to Katniss' small, noncommittal noise of acknowledgement. "And his dad is nice too, but," her voice grew hesitant, "I didn't like the Mellarks all together in one place."

Katniss froze, her mind going to the worst possible scenario that Prim might have witnessed. Prim followed her lead, stopping in the middle of the street. Luckily, it was a time of day when many were already in their homes preparing for dinner. No one was cussing as they had to swerve around them.

"Why is that?" Katniss asked.

"I'm fine," Prim said first. She knew what had made Katniss' voice go funny. "No one did anything to me or anything."

She rolled her eyes at the idea that someone might have. Katniss bit her tongue.

"What was it then?" she asked.

Prim shrugged and turned away, beginning to walk towards the Seam at a slower pace. She kicked at the dirt with her feet as she went.

"They're...weird together."

She whispered the sentiment. Prim wasn't one to insult people, and just saying that much made her uncomfortable.

"Weird how?" Katniss pressed.

Though she had an idea of the tension Prim would have witnessed, she couldn't quell her curiosity about how, exactly, the Mellarks interacted with each other on a day-to-day basis. She hadn't seen them together much. The number of times she'd been inside the bakery could be counted on one of her hands, and the family never went anywhere else together.

"The bakery is really quiet," Prim said. "All five of them move around." She wiggled her fingers in the air to demonstrate. "But no one talks. So, I tried to be quiet too, but I couldn't be as quiet as them."

Katniss, who had listened to Peeta's loud footsteps echoing behind her many times, had difficulty believing the boy could be as quiet as Prim had implied he was.

"You could have said something yourself," Katniss said.

"I tried, but Mrs. Mellark always looks angry, and if I said something, she'd look at me. I don't think she likes me."

Katniss patted a pouting Prim on the back.

"That woman doesn't like anyone," she said, "not even her own family. I'm sure you realized."

Prim's eyes widened for a second.

"I guess she doesn't," she said. "I didn't think about it like that, but she does scowl a lot at them. She yelled at Ry because he wasn't working fast enough. It was loud, and he didn't even look up from kneading the dough for it.

"She didn't yell at me though," she added with a small smile at Katniss. "Just looked mean sometimes."

While that wasn't entirely reassuring, Katniss did her best to smile back.

"Ry's the only one she yelled at?" she asked.

"She was angry the whole time," Prim said, "but it wasn't yelling except at Ry. She did call Mr. Mellark useless though, and I think she said something to Peeta that I couldn't hear. It made him look sad, but I didn't ask about it."

She looked at Katniss, her eyes shining with a few unshed tears.

"He hadn't done anything. He was carrying a tray of muffins. His mom got in the way. He managed to save them, but she got mad at him anyway. It was like that one Capitol woman who's always on TV. She has that show where she yells at people, you know?"

It was a show their mother had told Prim not to watch. It wasn't popular in Twelve, but it seemed to be in the Capitol, if how frequently it aired was any indication. Katniss held no interest in it, so she couldn't remember the woman's name any easier than Prim could.

The woman brought people on TV to yell at them about what they were doing wrong in their lives. Each time, the interview would devolve into the host going on an angry tirade at the guest, who would undoubtedly conclude the interview in tears as the studio audience cheered the host on.

Katniss had only seen bits and pieces of several episodes as she found the show painful to watch. She also, however, wouldn't have compared Mrs. Mellark to the host except to say that they were both entirely unpleasant to be around.

"Yeah, I know the show," she replied.

There was a moment of silence as Katniss tried to figure out what she should say next. Prim was lost in her own thoughts, trying to process what she had seen, and she spoke before her sister could make a decision.

"I know families don't always like each other," she said, "but I'd never seen something like that. You're mad at Mom sometimes, but not like that. It's like Mrs. Mellark is mad about everything."

"She is," Katniss replied before she could put much thought into it. "That's what's wrong with her."

Of that much, Katniss was certain.

"What I've never understood," Katniss said slowly, "is why she's angry at the world. Her family owns a bakery, so they always have food around. I'm willing to bet she hasn't had a friend reaped, if she's ever liked anyone enough to care if they were reaped. As far as people in Twelve go, she's doing pretty well."

"Maybe she's just sad," Prim said quietly, "and that's what makes her mad. Mr. Brookshire told us once that some people are sad for no reason. He said it has to do with chemicals in the brain."

"You're talking about mental illness. I don't know if that's what's wrong with Mrs. Mellark."

"But it could be?" Prim asked.

"It _could_ be," Katniss agreed.

It didn't really make a difference. There weren't any medical doctors in Twelve, let alone psychiatrists. Those were a privilege of the Capitol, where citizens were regularly screened for such things, sometimes even on television shows. All that Twelve got was a unit in health class during high school on how to identify the most common mental illnesses and what you could do on your own or to help others. Nothing more.

The district had come to accept that certain people suffered and life went on accordingly. It was no different for Mrs. Mellark. If professional help would have helped her get better, she'd never receive it.

"Do you think Mr. and Mrs. Mellark love each other?" Prim asked quietly.

Katniss' brain scrambled for a response. Prim was watching her with wide, curious eyes. Though it was a question, she had already determined the answer for herself; she merely wanted Katniss to confirm it.

"No," Katniss answered.

Everyone in Twelve knew of Mrs. Mellark's anger, and likewise, they knew of Mr. Mellark's sadness. When she was younger, Katniss had been oblivious to it, believing all couples to be as happy as her parents, but she'd pieced together over the years that this wasn't the case. Prim had to come to terms with it eventually too.

"Why did they marry each other then? Why not wait for someone they love or just stay single?"

"Your guess is as good as mine."

They were drawing close to home, and Katniss hoped their arrival would serve as an end to the uncomfortable conversation.

"But why—"

"Prim, I don't know, but all the merchants always marry each other. It's how things work. There's not many of them, so maybe they were each other's only option."

For a second, Prim looked like she was going to argue the point that merchants only married other merchants, likely using their parents as a counterexample, but then she latched onto Katniss' other words.

"Then why get married at all?" she asked. "Mrs. Mellark might have been happier single than being married to someone she doesn't like."

"You'd think," Katniss replied.

She'd had the same thought herself a number of times, though not necessarily about the Mellarks, but most people didn't seem to see it the way she and Prim did. Even though plenty of people remained unmarried in the Capitol, they were never single unless they were also miserable or a terrible person—even by Capitol standards

"Maybe she married him for the bakery."

Katniss looked at Prim in surprise, but her little sister didn't look her way as she spoke.

"She's really uptight about it and always making sure everything is perfect. Maybe she just wanted the bakery."

"Maybe."

It actually made sense to Katniss. While Mrs. Mellark's perfectionism in regards to the bakery could have had a number of explanations, the stock she placed in reputation and social standing was well known. Her brother still worked as the only cobbler in Twelve, and he did pretty nice business thanks to the crucial need for good working boots in the mines. Mrs. Mellark would undoubtedly have placed a lot of stock in choosing a suitor prestigious enough for her.

They had reached their house.

Buttercup slithered off the front step right into Prim's outstretched arms. The girl's entire demeanor brightened once she was cuddling with the cat, and Katniss had a rare moment of being thankful that she'd let the thing live. Prim didn't try to say anything more about the Mellarks.

 **A/N: Word count: 3,168**


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N: This is the chapter where Everlark really gets underway. I hope you enjoy it.**

 **Word count: 6,371**

The current school year came to an end, and Gale left permanently. In some ways, Katniss was jealous. What she was learning would be of little use to her in the future, so there was no practical reason for her to continue with school other than the law.

Working in the mines was dangerous. There was no denying that, so Katniss shouldn't have had any desire to be out of school when that was likely to be her fate just as it was Gale's. He already had far less time for hunting than he'd had as a student, whereas Katniss had all the time in the world for it during their short break between school years.

"Some days," Gale admitted during a rare day off while they were in the woods, "I think about quitting and hunting all day instead, see how much money I could make off of that. Probably more than I make in those mines. My family survived for years without anyone mining anyway."

"You're young and fit," Katniss said "They'll have you working in those mines no matter what you want. Besides, it's a more reliable income than the woods."

They could get enough food for their families, and sometimes, they could get enough to provide their families with extras from the Hob. There were always times when times were harder though. Sometimes you couldn't find anything to sell. At least the mines provided a paycheck that arrived on time every month for the same amount.

"I'd never actually quit," Gale said.

Katniss glanced over her shoulder at him as they walked. A frown creased his forehead, and he fiddled with his bow as if he thought something was wrong with it.

"I know it would be stupid to try it," he continued, "but sometimes I like dreaming about it. Those mines are not a fun place to be, Katniss."

"You think I don't know that?"

Her voice came out harsh, but it did nothing to deter Gale.

"I think you know because you've heard it secondhand, but it's a lot different actually being down there to see it for yourself. It's like the entire world is pressing in on you. Every day I go down and down and down. I start wondering if I'll ever come back up again. You're in another world when you're down there—not one that's better than Panem, mind you—and I can't stop thinking about how easily I could die if something went wrong. What would my mom do then?"

"I'd help her," Katniss snapped.

She didn't like to think about Gale dying the same way their fathers had.

"I know, but that doesn't make me feel better about dying."

Katniss didn't respond. Gale stopped walking, and Katniss, hearing his footsteps disappear, pulled up short in front of him.

"Everything feels different now," he said.

She turned to face him, bow held loosely at her side. An arrow hung in her other hand, useless considering they'd scared the animals away with their talking.

She didn't know how to respond. He was right, but he didn't need Katniss to reassure him of it. In many ways, she was looking forward to school restarting because it would let her forget where Gale was all day. School, at least, would be the same as it always had been. Boring but decidedly not life threatening.

"I'm always in the mines, and you're always with Mellark. Who would have thought you'd become close with a merchant kid?"

Katniss' hackles rose, and her shoulders stiffened.

"Peeta and I aren't close," she replied. "Not at all. Prim likes him. That's the only reason I put up with him."

Gale nodded, and Katniss chose to believe he had accepted her words without question.

"Maybe you think of it that way," he said, "but Mellark doesn't."

There had been countless walks home with Peeta since the first one, each one feeling more like a routine, though Katniss still found herself struggling to maintain a conversation with the baker. Gale had tagged along more and more as time went on, finding himself curious about Peeta's continued presence. Katniss' continued comments about it being terrible probably hadn't helped quell his curiosity.

The break from school had also meant a break from Peeta. Katniss hadn't seen him in more than a week as she'd made sure to traverse the perimeter of the town on her travels to and from the Hob.

"I know what you think about Peeta's intentions, but you're wrong," she said.

Peeta didn't like her. He couldn't. She could barely speak to the guy. What would he have seen in her that would have created feelings?

"You didn't use to be able to talk to me either, remember?"

Katniss didn't look at Gale, just turned around and kept walking. There was little hope of making a kill anymore, but she didn't want him to see her face as he continued speaking.

"It was a year after we met before you said something to me that wasn't about hunting or gathering or bartering in the Hob. For a while, I thought you hated me, and then I thought you tolerated me but would never actually be friends with me. I didn't expect this."

She didn't have to look at him to know he'd motioned between them to indicate their friendship. Truthfully, she hadn't expected 'this' either, though she didn't know how to explain how she had felt about him at the beginning without feeling cold. Things had been different then, it was true.

"My entire life, I've never felt like I needed friends," she admitted.

She'd never said even that much out loud, but she supposed admitting to it made little difference. Everyone could tell.

"I just haven't. People are confusing, and they always want to talk about things that aren't important. It was a waste of time. Besides, after Dad died, I had more important things to do. Why would I hang out at a friend's house after school when I could be hunting in the woods to get food we needed? It never made sense to me."

Gale said nothing in response. For once, Katniss found his silence unnerving.

"That's why I was annoyed when I found you in the woods that first time," she admitted. "The woods were a place where I could be alone and do what I needed to do. I didn't need any distractions in here like I had to put up with at school and everywhere else."

"Well, sorry for intruding."

Katniss finally looked at him, shooting him a half-hearted glare.

"That's why you kept talking to me. Because I proved I was useful to you."

It wasn't a question. Katniss figured that he'd realized as much for himself years ago and was only having it confirmed now.

"Kind of, but you were also hopeless with a bow at first. Remember everything I had to teach you?" she joked.

Her words broke the tension, and she was relieved to see Gale laugh at the memories of the long archery lessons that had made up much of the time they'd spent together in the beginning. Gale had never held a bow in his life, and he hadn't been a natural.

"I taught you some things too," he protested when he'd gotten his laughter under control.

"You did," Katniss said seriously. "And that's why I kept talking to you."

Gale nodded as he fiddled with the string of his bow. Katniss wished she knew what was going on in his head. Many would have been angered by her confession to have used him for his knowledge, but Gale knew her better than anyone else. Long ago, he had accepted that Katniss didn't 'make friends' as such and, therefore, had needed something else to cement their friendship than his company.

"Now though?" he asked. "If I had an accident tomorrow that left me unable to hunt again, what would we be then?"

Katniss swallowed against her fear of that idea. She couldn't look him in the eye as she answered.

"Friends, I'd hope."

Gale nodded instead of verbally responding. He took a step forward, around Katniss, prompting her to follow him instead of taking the lead.

"That's all I'd ask for," he said. "But I guess that's why you haven't given Peeta a chance? You don't think he's useful?"

Katniss hesitated, images of a rainy day in her mind's eye.

"Something like that," she said.

XXX

Katniss kept her head bowed as she hurried along the fringes of town. She'd be hunting alone, and she was anxious to get into the woods. It would take longer for her to get the same amount of food that it did when Gale came along. She growled in frustration as she thought of how little she could carry by herself.

"Katniss?"

She froze.

The voice was more familiar than she wished it was, but she hadn't expected to hear it for another week. She'd done such a good job of avoiding the bakery, which resided on the opposite side of town from where she stood.

When she turned to look at Peeta, he wasn't dressed for working in the bakery. His clothes were flour free and looked newer than most of the clothes he wore on a daily basis, though they were also a little worn.

"Hi," she said, raising a hand awkwardly.

Peeta gave her a small smile, walking towards her like one might approach a skittish animal.

"Long time no see," he said.

"Yeah," Katniss replied. "A long time."

Two whole weeks, give or take a few days. She'd hardly seen Gale for those two weeks either, but it didn't actually feel like it had been that long. There were plenty of other things to keep her busy. She hadn't had time to think about it.

Peeta looked down at her clothes. He seemed mesmerized by them, like he perhaps hadn't believed she traversed into the woods until he saw the clothes she wore especially for it. Not that the outfit itself was particularly special. Her boots were merely a version of what the miners wore in the caves after all.

"Are you going out there?" he asked, motioning towards the woods as one might a place of unspeakable horrors. There was awe in his voice.

"Yes."

It was quiet for a few seconds as both struggled to decide what they were meant to do next.

"Are you meeting Gale out there, or…?"

"Gale's in the mines."

Peeta paused for a second before nodding.

"Of course. He graduated. That means he's working now."

There was another moment of silence as Peeta put the facts together.

"You're going out there by yourself?"

Katniss felt a surge of irritation that Peeta was concerned for her safety. As if he had a reason to care. She was the one who had a weapon that she knew how to use. There was nothing in the woods that she feared.

"I've done it before. There's nothing out there that an arrow won't kill, no matter what ridiculous rumors people like to spread about mountain lions."

Peeta looked simultaneously frightened and impressed. Katniss wished he'd stop looking at her when she wasn't sure what she was supposed to say.

"Right," Peeta said. "Of course there isn't."

He hesitated for a moment; Katniss was sure he'd walk away. She'd be left to head into the woods, Finally, and Peeta could go back to doing whatever the hell he did when he wasn't around her and Prim or at the bakery.

But he didn't leave.

"Can I come with you?"

"Out in the woods?" Katniss clarified. "In the trees with the coyotes and the mountain lions?"

It was impossible for her to picture it. Peeta and the woods, the two things didn't fit together in her mind. The only people meant to be in those woods were her and Gale. Peeta wouldn't have a clue what to do out there. The idea of it was almost comical, but Katniss couldn't find it in herself to laugh.

She narrowed her eyes.

"I can handle myself."

Peeta held up his hands in surrender.

"I know," he assured her. "Really. You stand more of a chance out there than I do, but I'd like to see it."

Katniss watched him for a moment, blinking slowly.

"You want to see the trees and the birds? The rabbits? That...what? Excites you?"

While the woods were a place of comfort for her, they couldn't be the same for Peeta when he'd never experienced them before. If he thought things out there were exciting, then he was setting himself up for disappointment.

"You know we won't actually see a coyote or a mountain lion, right?" she asked, earning a slow nod from him. "They stay away from us. I've never even seen a mountain lion."

"I'm not asking because I want to see a mountain lion," he said, his wide, fearful eyes further reinforcing the point. He hesitated before he continued, "I guess I just want to understand what you love about the place."

Katniss stared at him. Her gaze made him nervous, causing his eyes to glance in one direction and then another before landing back on her.

"Only as long as the stories aren't all true," he joked, scratching the back of his neck.

"They're not true," Katniss said, voice wavering. "Not most of them."

There were stories that frequently circulated among the children in District 12 of the possible horrors of the woods. As more years passed with the woods off limits, the stories became more elaborate, filled with a wide variety of horrors.

"There are no bloodsucking wolves in there," she said. "Just your run-of-the-mill woodland animals."

That didn't sooth Peeta, who was probably thinking of the mountain lions again. She couldn't tell him that those weren't real.

"We're not anything's food," Katniss said. "Everything in there will leave you alone if you leave it alone."

It was that simple, even when it came to the mountain lions, but Peeta looked as reassured as anyone else in District 12 would have been. When you'd never seen a wolf face-to-face, it was easy to find them terrifying.

Peeta looked hesitant for a moment, and Katniss wasn't sure why she was suddenly eager to see him go into the woods instead of chickening out. All she knew was that her skin was buzzing at the thought of seeing Peeta, this merchant boy who confused her so much, be brave enough to go beyond the fence.

He glanced at her bow as if sizing up its effectiveness against potential threats. The sight of it reassured him. He nodded briefly.

"I want to go," he said.

He tried to smile, though he couldn't manage much of one.

"Mountain lions or no mountain lions," he joked.

"We have to be quiet," she said, beginning her walk towards the fence and motioning for Peeta to follow. "Noise scares off the animals. Remember, anything we're after is more scared of us than we are of it. They can't know we're there."

Peeta gave a quick bob of the head.

"Quiet, right. I can do that."

Katniss had serious doubts about that as she listened to his footsteps echo behind her as they walked. If Peeta was that loud on the clear, level streets of town, it was only going to get worse in the underbrush of the woods.

She didn't know how to teach someone to walk quietly. She and Gale had always done it naturally, or, at least, she assumed it was as natural for Gale as it was for her. There was no way that Katniss could put the technique into words. She could only hope Peeta would catch on as they went.

They ducked under the fence, Peeta turning his head this way and that in short, jerky movements that would have drawn attention to them had anyone been bothering to monitor the perimeter of the district. Katniss didn't say anything about it. No one was looking anyway.

"Welcome to the woods," she said when they were far enough into the trees that the fence could no longer be seen.

She glanced at Peeta, watching him as his eyes roved over everything. She couldn't read his expression to tell if he was impressed or frightened.

"There's so much shade," he said. "It's almost like being inside."

As expected, Peeta's footsteps echoed through the air around them, startling a few birds here or there. Not a good sign. Katniss wasn't sure how she could explain to him that he was a liability, that it was doubtful she would catch anything with him trailing behind her.

"Is that a mockingjay?" Peeta asked, not bothering to keep his voice quiet now that they were far from the fence.

Katniss didn't turn around to look as she heard the bird in question mimic Peeta's tone.

"Yes."

She'd forgotten that many in District 12 had heard about mockingjays more than they had seen them, as the birds didn't often cross the boundaries of the fence. It was easy to forget how many things she had experienced firsthand that others around her hadn't thanks to her illegal excursions.

They came upon one of her and Gale's usual clearings, one with a fallen log positioned along its edge that they often perched on. Peeta's eyes were still wide as he stared at everything around him, unable to believe he'd gone into the woods.

"You walk loudly," Katniss said simply, having failed to come up with a nicer way to say it.

Peeta's eyes snapped to her before narrowing in confusion.

"What do you mean?"

He glanced down at his feet as if that would help him decipher the words.

"I can hear you behind me," Katniss continued. "You were scaring birds away."

It took a second for realization to dawn on Peeta's face. His cheeks turned a light pink as he averted his eyes to the ground.

"Sorry," he said. "I'd never thought about something like that before. I guess everything else is as scared as the birds?"

"Yes. Gale and I have been hunting in these woods for years. The animals aren't stupid. As soon as they know we're there, they'll be gone. Everything except the bees."

Peeta took a few steps back and then forward again, looking down at his feet as the underbrush crackled beneath them. When he looked up again, he was regretful. He scratched at the back of his neck.

"I guess I should go back then."

He hesitated, but Katniss, who knew she should let him go, didn't say anything until he'd taken several steps away from her.

"No, it's fine," she said. She didn't admit that she'd known they'd have this problem before they'd gotten to the woods. "We can gather plants. They don't run away."

Peeta grinned at Katniss as if she'd made a joke, but all she'd done was state the truth.

Though she was annoyed she wouldn't be catching any meat—which was entirely her fault after inviting Peeta to stay—she laid her bow against the log with a sigh.

Thankfully, it was late spring, and a number of plants were readily available. They'd have no trouble, even if it would have been preferable to have some meat to go with what they gathered.

"There's a blackberry bush over here."

She led Peeta to the fringes of the clearing where the blackberry bush sat. It was a bush she and Gale visited every year, but they hadn't paid it much mind since they'd gathered the last of its fruit a year ago. The berries had only begun to ripen over the last week or so, and Katniss had no idea how many edible berries they would find.

Hunching over the bush, she pushed branches out of the way and pulled others closer to inspect them for fruit. She felt Peeta approach and watch her from over her shoulder. When she'd found a good branch, she motioned for him to come closer, trying to ignore the strange feeling in her stomach as they bent over the same branch.

"These aren't ripe," Katniss said, motioning to a number of the berries along the branch. "This one is."

She picked the aforementioned berry from its stem and held it out to Peeta, who took it from her, their fingers brushing. He rolled the fruit around in his palm.

"It's simple," Katniss explained. "You'll know they're ripe when they look like the blackberries you eat."

Peeta nodded, but a frown had creased his forehead.

"I've never eaten blackberries," he said, sounding embarrassed.

Katniss blinked at him several times. It was all but impossible for her to believe Peeta's words. Fruits weren't plentiful in Twelve, but you could find them in the legal grocer's as well as in the Hob. Apples were a staple that could be found year round, whereas the berries came when in season and in smaller numbers. Still, they were there, and Katniss had always thought the merchants were the ones buying them.

"You bake them into cakes," she said almost as a question. "I've seen them at the bakery. The blueberries and the raspberries and the blackberries."

"I've baked with them," he clarified. "I could pick out which ones look edible, but I've never eaten them myself."

When Katniss still looked confused, he continued.

"Using fruit bumps up the price of something. That stuff with the berries is some of the most expensive stuff in the bakery. We only bake it in small amounts we know will sell, which means it's never around to go stale. I've never eaten any of it."

Katniss felt a pang of sadness at the thought of Peeta baking things that he'd never know the taste of. It felt strange knowing that a baker wouldn't know if what they were making tasted good or not.

"My parents never really buy fruit," Peeta continued. He was looking at the bush, not Katniss. "If they do, it's the cheaper stuff. Never the blackberries. But I pretty much grew up on stale bread and whatever vegetable was cheapest in the market. Once or twice a week, they'd add the cheapest meat."

Her family also bought the cheapest fruit in the market, so it wasn't as if she couldn't understand. Still, they'd had their fair share of the fruits available in the woods. She always thought the town kids would have had their own share of District 11 provided berries.

"I just thought…" Katniss hesitated, suddenly self-conscious of what she'd thought. "Since you bake so much, I figured you were allowed to eat it. Even the stuff with berries. Sometimes."

Peeta still held the berry in his hand. Instead of answering immediately, he held the fruit out to Katniss, who opened her sack to reveal a smaller bag that she pulled out and held open for him to drop the lone blackberry into.

"Some of the stale stuff we can eat," Peeta said. "But that's never the more expensive stuff."

"Well," Katniss said, "you can eat some of these then."

"No," he answered reflexively. "You should take them to your family, to Prim."

"Prim's fine," Katniss said, though she couldn't look Peeta in the eye as she said it. "She's had blackberries her whole life, and she's not going to starve without them. There are plenty of other things we can get while we're in here."

Peeta nodded and, with the slightest hesitation, took the small bag that Katniss handed him. They bent over the bush again, each twisting off what ripe berries they found. Peeta would occasionally ask if an ambiguous berry looked ripe to her, but for the most part, they worked in a companionable silence that Katniss found relaxing.

Even when picking berries, Peeta made more noise than she did, but she didn't care what he was scaring off anymore. As she worked, she thought of the other plants she could show him. Before, she had been considering this a one off trip for a straitlaced boy, but after learning that he'd never gotten to try berries before, Katniss began to consider which plants it would be most helpful for Peeta to know should he decide to risk another trip to the woods.

She was surprised that she wouldn't mind if he did return, especially if he were willing to go at it alone and leave her to hunt.

By the time they'd picked the bush clean of every ripe berry, Katniss had decided what to tell him next.

"You know, dandelions are edible?" she said as she led him over to a small patch of the wildflower.

XXX

Months passed with what felt like a new routine.

Katniss saw Gale one day a week. She saw Peeta on weekdays when he walked home with her and Prim, but she also saw him when he traversed into the woods with her on the rare days he could escape from his mother's tyranny at the bakery.

Those days weren't for hunting. She'd rearranged her schedule into hunting days and gathering days. If she found plants that could be gathered when Peeta wasn't with her, she'd make a mental note and decide to come back to them later if she thought they'd still be around then.

Peeta had been a quick student and could recognize almost as many plants as Katniss could after several months. She'd been surprised the first time he'd been the one to point a particular edible plant out as they walked, particularly since the plant had been largely hidden from sight. Because he had taken being invited into the woods with Katniss as an honor, Peeta took his task seriously and was slowly working towards being more of an expert on the local flora than Katniss.

What he still lacked was any substantial knowledge on the fauna. Yes, he had a general idea of what animals were around them, but each time Katniss tried to get him close to one, he would send it scampering away, much to his chagrin. So, it was with plants that they stayed focused.

Her hunting took place on the days she was alone or with Gale, who knew of her trips with Peeta only in the vaguest ways. Katniss shouldn't shake the feeling that she had almost betrayed Gale when she brought Peeta into the woods, so it had been difficult for her to discuss the trips with him aside from a comment here or there about having been with Peeta the day before.

"Why doesn't he come when I'm with you?" Gale asked out of the blue one day.

They were resting in one of their usual clearings. The same one Katniss had first brought Peeta to several months ago. So far, they'd had a productive day, and neither had felt guilty about sitting down to enjoy a long lunch break.

"I've told you," Katniss said. "I can't hunt when he's around. He walks like he's making noise on purpose, but it's worse because he can't actually control it."

"I know that," Gale said, rolling the cap of his water flask between his fingers. "But I could help the two of you gather too. Why do we never do that?"

There was a moment of silence before Gale gave up on receiving an answer and went back to eating his bread. It was only then that Katniss answered.

"I'd never considered it," she admitted. "These days have always been for hunting. I figured you'd want to do that instead of gathering plants with Peeta. Gathering was always your least favorite part."

It took a second for Gale to swallow his mouthful of bread, and Katniss felt increasingly tense as she waited.

"Yeah, I like hunting more, but I'm also interested in seeing Mellark in these woods. No one's ever out here except me and you. And he's a merchant kid to boot."

She had forgotten how novel having Peeta in the woods had been on their first trip. She could understand Gale's own interest in seeing it, but she couldn't shake her anxiety at the thought of having both boys with her in the woods at once.

"Sure, I don't see why we couldn't do that," she said. "I can ask Peeta to come with us next Sunday, but he probably won't be able to. Sunday is a busy day at the bakery, with everyone in the mines being off and all."

Gale sighed as if Katniss were purposefully getting out of the situation, but she hadn't thought of the excuse until she'd agreed to ask Peeta along. That wasn't to say she wasn't secretly thankful.

"You like him," Gale stated simply.

It was impossible for Katniss to tell how Gale felt about that. His voice had an odd, controlled quality to it that made him more difficult to read than usual.

"What do you mean? I never hated him."

She felt oddly defensive, though she had, in fact, been wary about having him around. A fact of which she and Gale were both aware.

"The only reason I brought him out to the woods in the first place was because he gave me that look that made me feel guilty for getting rid of him. I didn't think he'd want to come back."

"But you've started to like having him around."

It wasn't a question, and Katniss felt her cheeks heat up as she stared down at the half eaten apple in her hand.

"He's more useful than I expected him to be," she admitted. "Besides, it's kind of nice having him around when I can't have you."

Gale cringed, and Katniss realized how that might have sounded.

"Not that he's a replacement," she said. "It's just that he helps me gather more plants than I would be able to get otherwise, even if he scares off all the game. He knows almost as much about the plants in this forest as I do anymore. Soon, he'll probably surpass me. Gale, he's even started giving me recipe ideas about how to cook some of the stuff we find. You'd think the bakery was expanding into a full blown restaurant."

Gale's eyes narrowed.

"And you say he's not taking any of it for himself?"

Katniss shook her head and threw the core of her apple as far as she could, watching as it disappeared in the underbrush.

"I've tried to get him to take some, but he won't. Eventually, I stopped asking because he got weird about it when I did. I know it's his mom, even if he won't tell me it is. It's frustrating though. Why would she get angry at him for bringing home extra food? That doesn't make sense."

"That woman cares a lot more about her reputation than making sure her kids are fed," Gale said, scowling. "I can picture it: her getting angry and eating all the food herself in front of Peeta as some sort of messed up punishment. That's the way I imagine it playing out in my head."

It played out similarly in Katniss' own imagination, but that hadn't stopped Katniss from trying, at first, to get Peeta to take something, even if he had to hide it as he had the blackberries he'd taken that first day. He hadn't accepted any of her offers since then, and Katniss wondered if something had happened with the berries that he hadn't shared with her.

"It's weird," she said, picking at the bit of bread she had left.

She had piqued Gale's interest. He looked at her with one eyebrow raised.

"What's weird?" he asked.

"How that woman raised someone like Peeta. She's so," Katniss struggled for the right word before deciding on, "mean. And Peeta doesn't seem capable of being mean. How is that?"

Gale shrugged.

"I couldn't tell you. His dad's not bad, and his middle brother seems alright. I'm not so sure about the other one. What's his name?"

He paused, brow furrowed.

"I can't think of it," he concluded.

Katniss wasn't sure either. She had never had a reason to learn it before. He had left school several years ago, so Katniss had never seen much of him. For the first time, she realized that Peeta had never spoken to her about either of his brothers by name.

While she could have identified them by sight, Katniss had no idea what the boys were called.

"That family is strange," Katniss said. "Even Prim said so."

Gale didn't answer. He stood, stowing the sack that had held his lunch in his bag.

"Ready?" he asked.

Katniss shoved her last piece of bread into her mouth and stood, following Gale from the clearing. They headed in the direction of some of their traps, which Katniss knew was a sign that Gale planned to head home soon.

She scowled in confusion. They'd only just eaten lunch. They had hours until it would be too dark to hunt. But she didn't ask for the reasoning behind the decision. Maybe heading that way was a coincidence, not something that she should let bother her.

"So," Gale said, "do you still believe that Mellark doesn't want to be friends with you?"

He didn't bother to keep his voice down, which meant they weren't trying to catch anything. They really were heading for the traps.

"No," Katniss said with a roll of her eyes. "I don't get it though. His fascination with the woods that is."

Gale laughed, and there was an edge to it that bothered Katniss.

"I doubt he has any fascination with these woods," Gale said. "At least not any more than anyone in Twelve with their over the top stories."

Katniss climbed over a large branch that laid across their usual path.

"You wouldn't say that if you'd seen him in here."

"Oh, he's interested. It's just not in the food."

Katniss reached out to grab ahold of Gale's shoulder, bringing him to a stop. When he turned to face her, his face was tight.

"What does that mean?" she asked.

Gale tilted his head as he looked at her. After a few tense moments of analyzing her, Gale let out a snort, shaking his head. He continued to head for the traps, but he did answer Katniss' question. In a way.

"You really have no idea, do you?"

Katniss stomped after him, for once her footsteps not as quiet as she prided herself on being. Gale's legs were longer than hers, and he was making no attempt to slow down his stride for her benefit.

"No idea about what?" she snapped.

Gale rarely did this, talk vaguely instead of being upfront. He knew how much Katniss despised people talking in vague terms and expecting others to understand. This was one of the behaviors that turned her off from talking to people.

They had reached the first trap, and Gale took his time to answer as he removed a rabbit from the metal clutches. Katniss did nothing to help.

"Mellark is in love with you," Gale stated simply.

He was staring down at the rabbit as he stowed it in his sack. Katniss' eyes widened, and her mouth gaped as she stared at Gale. The word 'love' sent unpleasant shivers down her spine.

"He's only been talking to me for a few months. It's not possible to love someone that quickly."

Gale stood back up, his face an emotionless mask.

"Katniss, it's been almost six months since he started walking you and Prim home. My mom and dad had been together for five months before my mom proposed."

Katniss did the math for herself and realized that Gale was right about how long she and Peeta had been speaking. Prim's illness had been during the Hunger Games, and soon, it would be the Victory Tour. It was hard to have two more vivid markers of time than those.

"Maybe so," Katniss said, not backing down, "but he's still not in love with me. He talks to Prim more than me whenever she's around, and, yeah, we spend time together in the woods, but so do me and you. It doesn't mean he's in love with me."

Gale was growing increasingly agitated as he hurried through the task of checking trap after trap. Katniss couldn't understand why he was so adamant that Peeta had feelings for her anyway. Or why he seemed annoyed that Katniss didn't see it the same way.

They worked on the remaining traps in silence, Gale no longer trying to convince Katniss to see things his way. It wasn't until they were back within the confines of Twelve that Gale spoke again.

"It may shock you, but that guy isn't going into the woods because he has a newfound passion for botany."

Katniss hadn't actually thought Peeta's interest came from any particular love for plants, but she sensed that it was better to stay quiet than to snap at Gale for saying something annoying.

"He likes you," Gale said. "Maybe he would have helped Prim that day regardless because he's a decent guy, but he only noticed you needed help because he was watching you already. You have to have at least considered that it's true."

Gale's words left her scrambling for a response. She stared at him as her mind struggled to make sense of what he'd said.

She'd come to accept that Peeta wanted to be friends with her. That was easy to come to terms with once she'd realized that he was one of the rare types of people who wanted to be friends with everyone. It had little to do with her, personally.

She hadn't, however, considered that Peeta was interested in anything more than friendship. Her only close friend was Gale, and so far, nothing had happened between her and Peeta that wouldn't have happened between her and Gale. Nothing had felt outside the realms of an ordinary friendship.

In sixteen years, though, no one had professed romantic feelings for her, so she didn't really know what such a thing entailed.

"I guess it could be true," she responded quietly, "but I'm not as convinced as you are."

"Just wait and see."


	12. Chapter 12

**A/N: There's a warning for talk about dog fighting and miscarriages in this chapter.**

Gale's words haunted Katniss. Her mind had always been full of questions of survival. Suddenly, the only thoughts she was having were about Peeta.

Her thoughts weren't the result of romantic feelings of the nature that Gale had accused Peeta of harboring for her. Rather, Katniss was devoting an exorbitant amount of time to figuring out whether Gale was on to something or not.

There was no doubt that he was much better at understanding other people's intentions than Katniss was. He was popular at school, and whether that was a cause or result, he had more experience with understanding people than Katniss did.

He didn't know Peeta though. Not really. Katniss kept coming back to that one thread of hope. In all the time she had spent with him, Peeta had done nothing that had hinted at romance. Gale hadn't seen that, so he could fill in their trips with any hints he wanted. That didn't mean they'd actually been there.

He could have had his pick of the merchant girls in their class. Surely, they found him at least reasonably attractive. They always seemed to be smiling at him when Katniss saw them at school.

As she trailed after Peeta and Prim one afternoon, she found herself staring at Peeta's broad shoulders. The boy had always fascinated her, as much as she had hated it. She'd been trying to make sense of his motivations since he'd given her that damned loaf of bread all those years ago. Her efforts now weren't much different.

He and Prim were laughing with each other over something, Katniss couldn't have said what. It wasn't the scintillating conversation that was holding her attention.

Peeta glanced over his shoulder, and the blood in Katniss' veins ran cold. She sucked in a sharp breath and hoped it looked like she'd been staring around him at the street, not at his back.

They locked eyes, and Katniss noticed Peeta swallow, his bright smile dimming slightly.

"What do you think?" he asked.

Katniss tried to recall something about their conversation from the recesses of her subconscious, but it did her no good. Her mind hadn't taken in any of it.

"About what?" she had no choice but to ask.

Peeta's grin was different, gentler perhaps, than the smile he'd been giving her before.

"About the dog Cray bought," Peeta said. "Your sister thinks it's cute. I think it looks like an alien."

"It's uglier than an alien," Katniss retorted without thinking.

Her stomach twisted when Peeta gave a short laugh.

"You see," he said, turning back to Prim and allowing Katniss to get a good look at him again.

They continued arguing about the head peacekeeper's new mutt. Cray had been parading it around like it had won one of the stupid dog shows they sometimes aired from the Capitol, but there was no Capitol citizen that would have been caught dead with a dog that didn't have its papers and a recorded family tree reaching farther back than Katniss' own.

Cray's dog also looked a lot meaner than the fluffy dogs favored by the Capitol. The thing's entire purpose was to look intimidating. Cray would laugh as the dog growled at a passing kid who cowered into this mother's skirts. It was becoming his new favorite pastime.

Prim had been going on about rescuing the thing since she'd seen it, despite knowing it was a pipe dream. Even Prim understood what would happen if they stole from a peacekeeper.

"Its looks add to its charm," Prim said, repeating a sentiment Katniss had already heard from her. "He's a good dog. He's just been taught to be mean."

"Of course he has, Prim," Katniss said, taking a step forward and wedging herself between Peeta and Prim without thinking about it. "That doesn't mean the dog isn't dangerous or that it can be turned into a gentle lapdog."

"But it's not his fault."

"That doesn't make him any safer," Katniss said. "He'll bite you all the same, and Cray will laugh while it happens."

"Katniss is right," Peeta said.

Katniss turned to him in surprise. He was usually willing to play along with Prim's fantasies, even when they were too idealistic to become reality.

"The dog's dangerous," Peeta said as much to Katniss as to Prim. "Darius was in the bakery yesterday and said Cray has been bragging about nabbing the dog from a fighting ring in Two while he was visiting home."

"That's illegal!" Prim cried.

She had the same look of terror she'd shown when she'd caught Katniss attempting to drown Buttercup.

"So is hunting in the woods, but I do that every day."

Prim looked as if she'd been betrayed. Her head whipped between Peeta and Katniss as she wished for one of them to step in and stop reality from being reality.

"That's different," she said, a little more subdued. "Hunting doesn't hurt anyone."

It wasn't worth informing Prim that she had killed at least as many animals as Cray's dog had been forced to fight. Maybe she would have agreed that dog fighting was a true cruelty, far more than hunting, but Katniss couldn't claim that no animals had been harmed by her arrows.

"Whether it's different or not doesn't change the fact it happens," Katniss said. "Two happily fights over which of their kids get to die every year. How do you expect them to treat dogs?"

Prim was close to tears and had no response.

"He's out of that now," Peeta said. "No one's putting him in a fight."

Peeta's words and reassuring tone were able to do what Katniss' hadn't. Prim still had tears shining in her eyes, but she was able to quell her sobs that had been oncoming. She even offered Peeta a teary little grin.

Katniss caught Peeta's eyes over Prim's head and found herself giving him a slight nod of thanks before looking away.

XXX

The Victory Tour had always been a close second to the Hunger Games on Katniss' list of least favorite times of the year.

Each year, they'd be corralled into fences to stare at City Hall for hours. No matter how much time was spent in the winter cold, only a few minutes of the ordeal would be shown throughout Panem. Not only was it pointless, several people died each year, typically someone among the elderly or the infants or the ill.

The previous year, a pregnant woman had experienced a miscarriage in the middle of the event and had sworn for months afterward that it had been from standing in the cold for so long. The Capitol had carefully edited around the screaming that had ensued in the middle of the victor's speech.

Despite her frequent trips to the woods in the winter, the Victory Tour was always the one day a year that left Katniss feeling like she'd never be warm again.

The day had always been particularly hard on Prim, whose lungs struggled with the cold, sharp air. Luckily, she was coming into this Victory Tour not having had a recent bout of pneumonia. For all that Katniss still didn't like Adamas, she had to admit that his physical therapy advice had led to fewer stints on bedrest for Prim.

That didn't mean Katniss wasn't keeping an eye on her little sister as they squeezed tighter and tighter together within the fencing. Katniss swore that they gave them less room to stand every year. The peacekeepers stood at the back, pushing everyone closer to the stage as the crowd grew in size.

They always came as late as they could get away with before a peacekeeper arrived at their door with their stupid checklists. It left them with fewer people bearing down on them, and Prim had a somewhat easier time breathing.

It also meant, however, that they didn't have a good view of the stage, and they were often prodded by peacekeepers as reminders to keep staring at the backs of people's heads as if they could see through them.

Prim stayed wedged between Katniss and their mother, gripping their hands through her gloves and pressing into them whenever a peacekeeper came close to their part of the crowd.

Time stretched on. Katniss had no idea where the Hawthornes were. She'd gotten a glimpse of Gale when they'd first arrived, but the families had been ushered into the fencing at different entrance points, and she wouldn't chance weaving through the crowd when she needed to keep an eye on Prim.

Peeta's whereabouts were a complete mystery, but having come from the merchant's quarter, Katniss had to assume the Mellarks were much closer to the stage than they were. The merchants always seemed to be the Twelve citizens the Capitol chose to advertise to the rest of Panem. The peacekeepers would have been knocking on their doors and ushering them to the square long before they focused on the Seam.

The whistle of the train announced its arrival. Katniss swiveled her head in its direction in spite of herself. There was increased muttering throughout the crowd. There were some here who were genuinely excited to see the victor: Marvel from One. The same guy who had killed Rue and managed to disgust Katniss in a way no previous tribute had managed before.

There was little noise from the station once the train came to a stop, and the crowd had quieted as they waited for something to happen. Then, the large screens put up around the Justice Building flared to life, and Katniss could finally see Mayor Undersee on stage, standing from his chair and walking towards the microphone with his notes rumpled in his hands.

His mouth quirked upward in a small smile. The man had always had a habit of smiling at everything. Perhaps that was what had gotten him appointed as mayor in the first place.

"My fellow citizens," he began, "it is with great honor that we welcome the victor of the 74th Annual Hunger Games: Marvel Cline."

The doors of the Justice Building swung open, and Marvel shuffled out, flanked by his escort and mentor. He had his usual scowl on and didn't acknowledge the presence of Mayor Undersee as looked moodily upon the crowd.

His Capitol escort hovered behind him, hesitating as if he wanted to whisper something to the victor. He glanced at the cameras and came to the conclusion that doing so would be imprudent. With tight lips, he took half a step away from Marvel.

The cameras went back to Mayor Undersee, who was still smiling out at the crowd as if he hadn't noticed the guest arrive.

"Mr. Cline, we welcome you to our humble district. Here, we live simple lives, without many of the luxury items you are used to in District 1. However, please accept our token of appreciation for honoring us with your visit: coal, our district's proud export. We offer it to you in an exchange of friendship we hope will strengthen in the years to come."

It was Madge who stood to offer Marvel the small sack of coal. In the past, it had always been Mrs. Undersee, but the cameras weren't showing her today, and Katniss couldn't see the stage well enough to assess whether she was in her usual seat.

The sack almost slid from Madge's grip, and Madge herself nearly tripped in her heels while walking the short distance across the stage. The flush of her cheeks was noticeable on the screens. Marvel frowned at her in distaste, looking at what was surely Madge's best outfit in scrutiny. He held out his hands for the coal but didn't look at it or fake the gratitude that everyone was expecting.

Mayor Undersee plunged forward, determined to get his role in the whole affair over with.

"Now, Mr. Cline, we would love to hear a few words, if you'd be so kind."

He watched Marvel with one eyebrow raised, daring Marvel to go further off script.

Without any change in expression, Marvel turned to shove his coal into the waiting arms of his escort, who appeared close to tears. Marvel's mentor, a woman who towered over him without being in heels, glared at him as he passed her, keeping a close eye on his every move.

Marvel, standing behind the microphone, looked at the crowd for the first time. He tugged a sheet of paper from his pocket and took his time unfolding it, glancing up several times to look out at the crowd for a few seconds. Finally, he spoke in a flat, emotionless voice.

"People of District 12, thank you for inviting me to your home. It is an honor to see your treasured district. Because of you, I was able to keep warm on many winter nights as a child. I look forward to getting to know you better during the short time I have here and to visiting in the future with victors I have helped mentor."

He glanced up from the paper for the first time since he'd started reading and glanced in the direction of the families of the two Twelve tributes who were dead. His frown deepened when he saw them.

"Your tributes fought valiantly," he continued, giving a short nod to the families before looking away from them for good. "Alder's strength in battle was admirable."

Marvel paused. Katniss could see Marvel's spear going through Alder's abdomen in her mind. She wondered if Marvel was seeing it too. His face had been nothing but rage that day.

He looked out at the crowd with wide eyes.

"I'm sorry that I killed him."

There were whispers within the crowd, enough that, taken altogether, it created enough noise to disrupt what was happening on stage. Mrs. Everdeen gasped beside Katniss, and Prim looked at her with wide, questioning eyes.

The screens changed to Mayor Undersee's face instead of Marvel's. The Mayor had managed to keep his permanent smile, and he did his best to appear calm and relaxed, as if nothing were happening around him.

No victor had apologized before. Katniss lifted herself to her toes, stretching her neck as she tried to see Marvel upon the stage. It was a useless attempt.

Marvel's escort had hurried to Marvel's side and was whispering something in his ear as he blocked Marvel from sight. Katniss couldn't imagine what the Capitol would see later that night when their tour stop aired for all of Panem. She doubted it would be this.

Mayor Undersee was moving on the screen. He nudged Marvel to the side as discreetly as he could while beaming at the crowd.

"Thank you for your kind words," he addressed Marvel without looking at him. "We hope you enjoy our district while you're here. Our citizens are working on a delicious meal of Twelve's favorite dishes that we are sure you will enjoy."

Mayor Undersee began clapping until the crowd followed. On the screen, Marvel was ushered off the stage and back into the building. They wouldn't see him again. Ostensibly, he would be treated to the meal that Mayor Undersee had spoken about, but the only people allowed in the Justice Building during that part of the event were the visitors, the Undersees, and Haymitch Abernathy.

Katniss had never asked Madge about what the dinners entailed, and Madge had never bothered to share the information. Each year there was a promise that the victor would be treated to the specialty cuisine of Twelve, but Katniss had little idea what that meant unless it was a euphemism for not feeding them much at all.

The peacekeepers' masks hid their faces, making it difficult to tell what they were looking at as they let the crowd out of the corrals, but there was a rigidity to their movements that was unusual. One of them, Katniss noticed, kept glancing at the empty stage as if he expected something more to happen.

Becoming a victor was meant to be a reward, but Katniss had noticed over the years that all but the most headstrong of the victors grew subdued between their games and the Victor Tour. She'd thought Marvel would be one of the exceptions to that.

The people around them were excited, discussing amongst themselves what they had seen, even as peacekeepers kept pushing them forward to get them out of the area. Katniss lost her family in her thoughts. She hadn't realized she was walking close to the bakery until she heard her name over the noise of the crowd.

She twirled around, seeing Peeta standing on the porch of the bakery. She could see the rest of his family through the window, moving around the display room. There was even a customer inside.

"Shouldn't you be in there?" Katniss asked, motioning at the window as she let her legs carry her up the steps to stand even with Peeta.

Peeta glanced over his shoulder and shook his head.

"Mayor Undersee asked me and some of the other merchant kids to spend time outside today to make the district look livelier. His word, livelier."

Katniss found herself glancing around.

"Are there cameras around here?" she asked.

Peeta shrugged and lowered himself onto the top step with a sigh.

"Probably. I used to try to find them when I was a kid. I was never able to, but you've seen those random shots of the merchant's quarter they always have when they do their stupid voice overs about us. They're filming something somewhere around here."

Katniss felt a chill travel down her spine.

"How long do you hang out here for?" she asked, sitting beside Peeta.

"Just an hour or two. They don't care much about it once it gets dark. I don't think they want to show how dark it gets here at night."

Katniss thought of the images she'd seen of the Capitol at night. You could walk down the street and not even realize the sun had gone down. It baffled her.

"It must be easy to be scared of the dark in the city," Katniss remarked.

Peeta hummed in agreement, but he wasn't paying much attention to her words. His eyes were still on the stage, which remained flanked by most of Twelve's peacekeepers, though it was barren. The lights inside the Justice Building had come on in the room Katniss knew to be one wide open space that was used only for this one day of the year.

"Something's wrong," Peeta said abruptly, eyes on the hall.

"With Marvel?" Katniss clarified. "Yeah, that was weird."

"Not just with Marvel."

Katniss glanced at Peeta from the corner of her eye, ostensibly still watching the Justice Building.

"I don't get what you mean."

"Something was off with that guy," Peeta said after a moment of silence, "but there was something off with everyone on stage. His escort looked livid."

"That's not that weird," Katniss said. "Plenty of escorts act like that with their tributes. I thought Effie Trinket was going to do one of our tributes in this year if they managed to survive the arena."

"What happened on stage was different," Peeta said. "I don't really understand how, but it was definitely different than the past. Something was off. That escort was scared. That wasn't just annoyance because a tribute doesn't know how to wave properly."

Katniss hadn't picked up on that, but she was willing to give Peeta the benefit of the doubt.

"What do you think it was then?" she asked. "What would have them acting that way?"

The Capitol was a bundle of secrets that Katniss knew could never be unraveled. Those who started tugging on the strings paid consequences. Still, she couldn't help but ask, even as the Capitol cameras were hidden around them.

"That I don't know," Peeta said, "but I think something happened to Marvel. Something that changed him in a way that killing a bunch of kids couldn't, and I don't want to know what could have managed to do something like that."

Katniss felt a shiver travel down her spine at the thought. Everyone knew the Capitol was capable of anything malicious.

"But how would they have hurt Marvel in a way they don't other victors? Or why, I guess, is a better question. Why would it have his escort shaken up?"

"They know something," Peeta said, inclining his head briefly in the direction of the nearest peacekeeper. "Probably not everything, but they've never stuck around like this once everything's done. They usually just stick a couple beside the door."

"What's anyone going to do to cause trouble?" she asked. "No one around here would try to kill a victor. They're not that stupid."

"Maybe they're keeping Marvel in," Peeta said with a shrug. "It's as much of a possibility as them keeping us out."

"Not a chance. Did you see the look he gave the coal? That guy has no interest in exploring Twelve."

"I doubt he wants to stick around on a Capitol train either," Peeta pointed out. "Which would win out if you were him?"

The answer, at least for Katniss, was astoundingly District 12. She was sure it was for Peeta as well, but they'd never been exposed to the luxury that Marvel had, at least by proximity, in District 1.

"He has to put up with that for less than two weeks. Then he gets to live in one of those mansions and get paid more money each month than I'll see in my lifetime."

Peeta turned from the peacekeepers to look at her. His forehead was creased in a frown.

"Do you really think that's what being a victor is like? Sitting around in a nice house and spending all your money?"

"What else is it supposed to be like? Other than going to the Capitol and other districts a couple of times a year. It would be bearable, at least, if you had the money and if you could forget about the games."

"I don't think it can be that easy," Peeta said. "The Capitol wouldn't let it be."

"I don't understand it," Katniss said. "I don't get what they would have done to frighten an unsympathetic killer or why they would have done it in the first place. He did what they wanted."

"There's obviously stuff going on that we don't know about," Peeta said. "There always is with the Capitol."

"We should forget about it," Katniss said, even as her mind continued to run through possibilities. "They don't want us to know."

Peeta nodded, but it was slow, hesitant.

"It would be smart, but I don't know if I can forget about it," he said. "I want to know what's going on."

"Then _pretend_ to forget about it. It's not that hard to do."

Peeta didn't look convinced, but he nodded again, this time faster.

"Who do you think knows about it?" he asked, doing anything but forgetting about it. "Do you think something happened in District 1? Or was it the Capitol?"

"Peeta," said Katniss warningly.

They had very little chance of getting in trouble. The peacekeepers were far enough away that their conversation couldn't be heard, and anyone from Twelve would have ignored their conversation or joined in. Still, there were Capitol people close enough by that it felt dangerous.

"I'm serious, Katniss. Have you ever thought about how weird it is that we see the mundane lives of random Capitol citizens who haven't done anything important on TV each day while not having a clue what anyone in District 11, which is right next to us, is doing?"

"We see things sometimes."

"Two minute segments on a news broadcast once a month maybe," Peeta complained. "And we don't even know if what they're saying is true or not. Think of the Thirteen footage."

Katniss did. That looped footage with the same mockingjay fluttering across the corner over and over again, the recurring proof that the Capitol was full of lies. Everyone knew it—at least in Twelve—even those who chose to ignore it.

"What do you think is happening in Eleven then?"

Peeta shifted position, his arm brushing against Katniss', and even through the jackets both of them wore, Katniss felt the hairs on her arm rise.

"I don't know," he admitted. "That's what's frustrating."

"I wouldn't have pictured you being someone who'd get caught up in something like this."

"I wasn't. Not until you took me out into those woods."

Katniss turned to him in surprise to find Peeta's eyes already on her.

"One day, while we were out there, I started wondering what would happen if we kept walking in a straight line and never turned back. Honestly, I don't even know which direction is which out there, so I know how I'd end up. But if it was someone like you, Katniss, what would you be able to find out there?"

"More of the same," Katniss answered, trying to sound dismissive as her stomach twisted into knots. "A lot of trees and game until I eventually made it to the fence of another district or the ruins of Thirteen. Nothing more."

Peeta didn't look convinced. His gaze had turned from the peacekeepers to look down the street. They both knew of the loose area in the fence that one could find there.

"But we can't know that for sure," Peeta said, "because we can't see it for ourselves."

Katniss didn't want to tell Peeta that he was echoing statements that Gale had made to her over the years. She'd grown used to Gale's daydreaming of some promised land. Perhaps she shouldn't have been surprised that someone as bright as Peeta would similarly have dreams of escaping to a better place.

"We can't, but what would it change if we knew what was happening everywhere else? Either they have it worse than us or better. Whichever it is, I don't know that I want to know."

Peeta took a long time answering. At first, Katniss didn't think he would answer at all, and she was fine with that. Dropping the conversation would be better for the both of them.

Just as Katniss was plotting her leave, though, Peeta spoke.

"It couldn't be anything worse than what we can imagine," he said. "Knowing would make us stronger. All the districts together, I mean. That's why they keep it this way. We can't act together if we don't know each other. Not even people from the Capitol can come here, and they can do absolutely anything else."

"Only because all they want to do is dress up and cry over the egotistical maniacs on TV. Give them real problems, and the Capitol would chain them too."

"Teaching them about the districts would be a great way to show them real problems."

"Maybe," Katniss agreed reluctantly.

She had trouble seeing it. Experience told her giving people the benefit of the doubt was often a mistake. That rang doubly true for people from the Capitol who had more than proved that they lived shallow lives.

"But they already watch people die in an arena every year, and it doesn't seem to do much."

"On television. In an event staged like a show. Nothing about those games feels real unless you see the empty places the tributes leave after them. The Capitol doesn't get that. If they actually talked to us and saw the aftermath, it could be different."

There was something about Peeta that made Katniss want to trust in him and what he said, but she couldn't quite do it.

"Maybe I'm right," Peeta said. "Maybe I'm not. We'll probably never know. We'll just keep dying in our own districts and in the arenas without getting to speak to each other."

He made a noise of frustration.

"But I can't shake how close escape feels now that I've seen those woods and what they can give us that we could never get here."

It wasn't as if Katniss had never thought about it. The woods provided most of her family's food as it was, and if they took Lady, then they could even have a supply of dairy too. The only thing they'd need was shelter, but finding that wasn't what worried Katniss.

The Capitol might have excused her frequent trips into the woods, but if she didn't come back, she had no doubt that, for once, there would be consequences. Peeta was right in saying that the real reason for the fences was keeping them isolated. As long as they didn't seek out others, they were safe.

"It's suicide," she said decisively. "No one would be able to make it out there, no matter how well they know the woods."

"I know," Peeta said quietly, "but it's a tempting dream. And I won't be able to stop thinking about Marvel and what they're doing to him."

"Before you get too caught up in feeling sorry for him," she said, "remember what he did in that arena. He didn't just kill to survive, Peeta. He was enjoying it."

"Yeah, I know. That's why seeing him like this is jarring. I'm not saying I feel sorry for him exactly… I just want to know what's happening to him."


	13. Chapter 13

In the days that followed Marvel's victory tour visit, Katniss was able to forget what Peeta had said to her. She watched the rest of the stops on the tour as everyone else did, and though Marvel's general demeanor grew worse, Katniss didn't find she cared much when viewing it through a television screen.

She never told anyone how difficult it had been to watch Marvel face Rue's family in District 11 and read his lines. Prim insisted that he looked like he'd wanted to say more to them than he was allowed, but Katniss had scoffed at the idea, visions of Rue's murder still vivid.

The conclusion of the tour in the Capitol only made her loath Marvel more. He was back in his element in the refinery of the Capitol, the pain gone from his features. His nauseating smirk had returned once he was in One again, and it remained firmly in place as he greeted Snow and a contingent of victors.

The bulk of the party held in his honor wasn't for the average citizen to see, but Katniss could use her imagination to see him chatting with the wealthy who had funded his win and pulling favors out of them as someone who had earned a tight grip on their emotions.

Once the rush of the victory tour subsided, the Capitol citizens on TV began turning their attention to the next big event: the upcoming Quarter Quell.

Not having lived through one before, Katniss had almost forgotten it was coming until she'd heard the prattle on the television. Her mom grew restless once it began, saying little more than that the last Quarter Quell had been unbearable for her. Katniss figured it had something to do with Mrs. Undersee's sister, but she didn't ask any questions.

Haymitch, Twelve's only living victor, had won the last Quarter Quell, and the new one was drawing attention to one of the victors often ignored by anyone outside his district (and even those within it). Almost nightly, it seemed, the news programs featured segments where the anchor claimed to have spoken on the phone to Haymitch earlier in the day. They would read Haymitch's statement, which was never anything Katniss could picture coming from the man's own mouth.

"Haymitch" would express excitement about the upcoming Quell, talk about how he looked forward to mentoring the new tributes who would get to honor the Capitol with sacrifices of their own.

People in Twelve took to mocking the statements. Though they stopped doing so in Haymitch's vicinity after he yelled at a vendor in the Hob while buying his liquor.

Katniss had arrived at the tail end of the tirade, just in time to hear Haymitch growl, "Get some damn earplugs for when that godforsaken TV switches on. It would do the lot of you a world of good."

Then he'd gathered up his case of glass bottles, which clinked together as if backing up his statement, and disappeared back to Victor's Village.

The scene had increased Twelve's anticipation of the Quell announcement in a way the Capitol's propaganda hadn't managed. No matter Haymitch's own feelings, after all, he would be further in the spotlight during the 75th games, and that meant Twelve would be under scrutiny. Some, like Mrs. Mellark, were excited. She had taken to reminding people that she'd attended school with Haymitch. She even denied having banned him from the bakery years ago for looking "little better than the morphling scum."

There were a few derisive comments about how the woman hoped to be interviewed once the games rolled around. There were sinister whispers about how she hoped one of her own children were chosen for the arena so she could reap the benefits.

Katniss didn't dare dare spread that talk further, but as she watched Peeta's mood worsen, she was sure he had heard what people were saying regardless. He had grown quieter when they were in the woods.

His footsteps were louder, somehow, as he stomped through the forest, but Katniss didn't feel the annoyance at that she once would have. All she felt was concern as she watched him.

By the time of the official announcement, Katniss was ready for the Quell to be over with. She hated the way her stomach tightened at the thought of learning what this year's gratuitous torture would be.

Caesar Flickerman's large, smiling face appeared on their television screen. The camera was far too close. That was Katniss' first thought. She hated when the cameras did that, got up so close that you could see every crease in someone's makeup. It made her uncomfortable.

Flickerman's eyebrows were a bright electric blue, and when the camera zoomed out far enough, it became clear that his hair and entire outfit were too.

"Hello, fellow citizens," Flickerman greeted, smiling his nauseating smile.

Behind the camera, a crowd of Capitol citizens could be heard, ready for the Hunger Games excitement to start earlier than usual. Katniss wondered what it was like to get joy out of such a thing.

"Tonight is a very exciting night," Flickerman continued. "Tonight we begin looking toward this year's Hunger Games. For the first time in twenty-five years, this year's rules won't be what we're used to. President Snow is joining us tonight to remind us what this is about. Give it up for President Snow, everyone!"

The applause grew as the camera revealed President Snow sitting in a chair next to Flickerman. The confident man raised a hand towards the audience as if he were seeing them for the first time.

Snow had chosen a simple outfit that made him stand out next to Flickerman. His hair was stark white, as were his eyebrows, and his suit was a soft brown that wasn't unlike the color of Katniss' beloved hunting jacket, though it was crisper and made from velvet.

"Thank you for joining us, Mr. President."

Snow chuckled, prompting the audience to do so as well.

"Thank you for having me, Caesar. As you've said, tonight is an important night. I'm honored to share it with you and the rest of Panem."

Flickerman hummed in agreement.

"As am I, sir. As am I. Please, do tell us more."

Snow shared a smile with Flickerman that made Katniss' stomach churn before he turned to look at the camera, giving it his full attention.

"As you know, each year we celebrate the Hunger Games as a stark reminder of that horrible rebellion that ended with great loss of life. With so many years having passed, it's more crucial than ever that we take time to remember such a horrific moment in our past, or the mistakes of our great nation are doomed to be repeated.

"The founders of our treasured games knew that, as time passed, many would be tempted to forget what we commemorate each year, so they instigated the Quarter Quells. Envelopes were sealed during the institution of the games, with one set to be opened every twenty-five years.

"Within each envelope, we find a new rule or a changed rule that must be followed during that year's games. Tonight, we discover what the 75th Annual Hunger Games, our 3rd Quarter Quell, has in store for us in a few months' time."

Flickerman began to applaud, with the audience quickly following his lead. Snow quieted them with a wave of his hand. He stood as a cart was wheeled out by a woman dressed head to toe in bright red. She disappeared, leaving Snow standing behind the cart looking satisfied with himself.

The camera zoomed in on the lone envelope propped up on a shining silver tray. Across its front "75th" was emblazoned in looping calligraphy. It looked crisp, not like paper that had been lying around for 75 years.

Without another word, Snow picked up the envelope. There was a soundtrack that accompanied the action, one that urged those watching to feel the immeasurable tension of the unknown. Katniss shifted in her seat, clutching her hands in her lap. She looked away from the screen, but made herself look back when she saw the fear in Prim's eyes as she clutched at their mother's arm.

Snow smirked as he tugged out a small card, careful not to wrinkle it.

"This year," he announced, holding the card for the cameras to see, "the tributes will be reaped from the entire population of each district, excluding only the current victors. All previous tessarae slips for an individual will be included."

Mrs. Everdeen gasped, a hand coming up to cover her mouth. Prim looked at her, eyes wide as she tried to decide how to best comfort the woman.

It took several minutes for Mrs. Everdeen to begin crying. Flickerman encouraged the audience to applaud louder than they ever had before. Snow smiled and accepted their gratitude at having been provided a grand show for the summer. Then Flickerman offered his thanks to Snow one more time, Snow waved, and that was the end.

The television shut itself off, and Katniss became intensely aware of the way her mother's body was shaking as she tried to hold in her sobs.

"Mom?" Prim said, reaching out to place her hand over Mrs. Everdeen's.

Their mother didn't answer her with words. She shook her head, hiding her eyes from her daughters.

"I'll be fine," she said, struggling to sound as if she were telling the truth. "Completely fine. What matters is that you girls have a much smaller chance of being chosen. We'll all be just fine."

XXX

Katniss forgot about Gale until the next day. For years, they'd bonded over the fact that each of them shared a number of tessarae slips, but Gale had always been the one person she knew with more than herself.

With so much else occupying her mind, she hadn't spared a thought that this games had been meant to be the first where Gale wasn't part of the reaping. He was nineteen, out of school, and working. It should have been the first year that Katniss didn't worry about him.

The miners streamed out of the mine, a few talking and laughing with each other but most just focusing on getting home as quickly as possible. It took awhile before Katniss found Gale amongst the crowd. She weaved her way through the miners until she was at his side.

He looked hesitant when he saw her, but he slowed down and directed her off to the side, out of the way of everyone walking by. Once they were alone enough that they could talk without being disturbed, Katniss spoke.

"Are you okay? I can't imagine…"

She wasn't sure what else to say, so she had no choice but to let her words trail off. She couldn't imagine having felt the relief of being safe only to have danger forced on you again.

"I'm fine," Gale replied, not looking at Katniss. "At least I can volunteer if one of them, especially Posy—"

"Wait. Posy?"

Her brow furrowed as she stared at Gale in confusion.

"Yes, Posy," Gale said slowly, looking at Katniss as if he were working out a puzzle. "You realize that Snow said everyone except the victors will be in the reaping? That doesn't mean everyone twelve and up, Katniss. It's _everyone_."

Ice ran through Katniss' veins.

"My god…" she breathed. "But Posy, she's four. And babies. They can't send babies in there. How are they meant to fight? There wouldn't be a fight. Not even the Capitol could see that as anything but murder!"

"If I had any hope left in the humanity of the Capitol, Katniss, then it's gone. They're monsters who cheered last night when they heard that more innocent people, _children_ , are going to be up for murder. They don't deserve the benefit of the doubt."

"As much as I hate them, they might not realize the rule means younger kids. Babies. _I_ didn't realize it. Maybe, when they do, they won't be as excited. Snow could—"

"You and I both know Snow would never have allowed the rule to be implemented if he expected backlash from the Capitol, and he knows better than anyone what he can get away with. There won't be anyone trying to stop this, Katniss. Not there and not in the districts. We're going to sit back and let it happen like he have been for seventy-five years."

"Gale," Katniss whispered, eyes flickering around them. "What you're saying is dangerous."

These were the types of complaints that got people killed. They were taught in school about past "criminals" who had been subjected to death for those very sort of words.

"I don't care, Katniss. I'm tired of living in fear and offering myself and my siblings up for slaughter every year. Putting my baby sister's name in is the last straw. They hold all the cards, and Snow believes he's safe, that no one will do anything to stop him. And he should. No one's done anything for decades while children were being killed. And I don't just mean in the games."

Katniss felt anger warring with fear.

"You're talking as if the districts have had a choice. We both know what happened the last time the districts tried to fight the Capitol. What do you think they'd do if we did it again? Bomb us to dust like they did Thirteen?"

"Just like they want us to _think_ they did to Thirteen," Gale snapped.

Katniss froze. The world around them had blurred.

"What are you talking about?"

Gale sighed, running a hand through his hair. He glanced around to make sure no one was in earshot.

"There's been talk in the mines," he whispered, leaning in close. "Everyone knows the Capitol uses the same old footage of Thirteen on their news broadcasts. People used to think it was because it was too dangerous to travel there, but not anymore. The Capitol could easily send a drone if they wanted us to see it."

"What are they saying in the mines then? They can't possibly believe Thirteen's still there without us knowing about it."

"But they do." Gale looked pained to say it. "More people believe it every day. I'm not sure who started the talk, but at least half the miners have begun doubting what we've been told, and the number's growing every day."

"And you?" Katniss asked. "Which half are you in?"

Another sigh, one laced with frustration. Another pass of his hand through his hair as he considered his words.

"I can't make myself see it any other way anymore."

Katniss growled in frustration, and Gale was quick to defend himself.

"You know as well as I do that using that footage makes no sense. There hasn't even been any aerial views, which wouldn't take as much effort as shipping a reporter out there. That has to mean they're hiding something, and what else could it be if it's not the fact that Thirteen is still there, safe and sound?"

"I don't know, and it's safer if I stay clueless."

Katniss turned to walk away from him, but Gale hurried after her.

"Look, if you'd asked me a few months ago, I would have raised an eyebrow, but I can't after listening to what everyone has to say."

Katniss came to a stop, watching Gale with unease.

"But things are only going to get worse if we keep giving the Capitol what they want. If we have any hope of surviving, we have to fight back, and there might be a place we can go that's entirely free from Capitol control."

"Say that's true," Katniss said. "Say Thirteen is still there, still full of people, rebuilt. What's to say they'd accept refugees? What's to say they wouldn't turn anyone over to the Capitol to keep themselves safe? Taking in Panem citizens would make them a target for the Capitol.

"I doubt they'd want that if they've left us to fend for ourselves for so long."

"Because I have to believe the people of Thirteen would be better than the Capitol, and if they want to lock me in prison for entering the district, I'll take it as long as I stay in their custody and not the Capitol's. It's more hope for surviving than I have here."

He said it with such confidence that Katniss wanted to believe him, but the doubts rang too strongly in her mind. Getting Prim across the wilderness that laid between Twelve and Thirteen without being picked up by the Capitol would be impossible. To place their trust in another government when the only one they'd ever known would have happily seen them dead, was more than Katniss could manage.

"What are you planning?" Katniss asked, eyes narrowing. "You're not thinking of sneaking off in the middle of the night and trying to find it."

"Not yet," Gale said with an uneasy shrug. "Not until I can get my family prepared and not until I have a clearer idea of what we might find there. I'm not the only one who wants to go though. Others are talking about trying to find it, and they don't want to wait as long as I'm willing to."

She could hear the worry in his voice, the knowledge that, if anyone tried to find Thirteen, it would be harder for another to follow in their footsteps.

"If they do, they'll be killed," she said coldly. "You know that."

Gale gave a short nod, his jaw taut.

Katniss took a step closer to him. Leaning on her toes, she looked him square in the eye.

"Promise me you won't do something stupid," she said.

Her voice was close to cracking, and she swallowed with difficulty before she continued.

"Don't get yourself killed."

"I don't plan on it," Gale said.

He stared back in a wordless challenge for her to believe him.

Katniss took a step back, not tearing her eyes from his right away.

 **A/N: Word count: 3,003**


	14. Chapter 14

**A/N: A second chapter in just a few hours? I think it's the rain's fault. Anyway, there's a lot about Mrs. Mellark's abuse in here. Be warned.**

 **Word count: 1,495**

In the aftermath of Snow's announcement, suspicious glances were directed towards the peacekeepers, who were nervous themselves knowing they'd be entered into Two's own reaping. Most of them had hoped for an escape from Twelve since they had received their post but through promotions, not the Hunger Games.

The most noteworthy effect of the announcement that Katniss noticed came in the form of Peeta. She'd noticed it when she'd looked across the cafeteria at lunch, but it was Prim who first said it aloud that same day when he joined the two of them outside the school.

"Oh, no! Peeta, what happened to your arm?"

Prim rushed forward, ever the nurse. She had nothing with her to treat the injury, but that didn't stop her from gently grasping Peeta's forearm and inspecting the bloody bandages that covered the wound.

The blood that stained the bandage was the rusty red of old, dried blood.

"Your bandage needs to be changed," Prim said. "It'll get infected if you keep this one on."

She observed the bandage, turning Peeta's arm in her hands to do so.

"This is the only bandage we had," Peeta admitted with a surprising lack of embarrassment.

Katniss raised one eyebrow. Bandages weren't much of a luxury item. Even if one couldn't afford them, it was relatively easy to make them from old clothing scraps. She'd never heard of someone keeping one on for too long because they hadn't had any clean ones to spare.

"We have some at home," Prim said with a bright smile. "I can fix your arm up for you. I think we have some antibiotic, too, that I could use. Mom used some of it the other day on a bite that Lady got."

Despite the nastiness of the wound—it wasn't a simple papercut by any stretch—Prim looked gleeful at the idea of having a real, human patient.

"That would be nice. Thank you," Peeta said, though he had finally begun to look embarrassed.

"What happened?" Prim asked as they began making their way to the Seam.

Her eyes were wide and eager to hear his story. She trailed closer to his side than usual as she monitored him for signs that his condition was more serious than she had been able to ascertain in her first inspection.

Peeta glanced away from her, his lips tightening for a fraction of a second before his smile returned.

"We were watching the Quarter Quell announcement, and my mom was working. When she heard the news, she got a bit, uh, emotional. She… Well, she ended up throwing the knife she was holding. She meant to hit the TV, but she's never had reason to develop an accurate aim, so, well, this happened."

He motioned at his arm, and Katniss and Prim both followed his gaze. Bile rose in Katniss' throat, while Prim's mouth dropped open in shock.

"It's not a big deal," Peeta hastened to add. "It'll heal quickly enough. It wasn't even that painful. We've all slipped up a time or two with knives in the bakery."

Images of the scene flashed through Katniss' mind as if she'd been there: Mrs. Mellark red faced and sweaty as she always was from the heat of the ovens and her own anger. She'd started shouting at the television, letting a knife fly from her hands while paying no attention to where her son stood.

Or maybe she had. Maybe she'd hit exactly who she'd been aiming for.

"It is a big deal," Prim said. "Katniss has only cut herself like this once, and she uses knives all the time. And that time wasn't even with a knife."

Peeta's eyebrows raised.

"What did you cut yourself on then?" he asked Katniss.

"One of Gale's traps," she admitted, grimacing at the memory. It had been the most pain she'd felt in such a sudden rush. The steady build of hunger pains hadn't prepared her for it. "It closed on my hand while I was setting it. That's usually Gale's job. He's better at it."

It had been the result of a stupid mistake on her part, but she didn't go into detail about that.

Peeta winced, looking too sympathetic for the one who had a bloody bandage wrapped around his arm.

"I'm sorry," he said, which Katniss shrugged off.

"I'm fine. I'd be more worried about yourself."

"Peeta will be fine too," Prim said in a tone that managed to sound comforting to Peeta and reproachful to Katniss all at once. "He just needs some medicine."

When they reached their house, Prim hurried through the door, tugging Peeta behind her. He glanced back at Katniss in amusement, and she couldn't help but grin at him.

Mrs. Everdeen raised an eyebrow when she saw the boy that her youngest daughter had dragged into the house.

"Mrs. Everdeen," he greeted, tilting his head towards her.

"Mr. Mellark," Mrs. Everdeen replied, mimicking his tone while adding a small grin.

Katniss watched Peeta until Prim instructed him to sit on her and Katniss' bed. She blushed such a deep red that she turned to hide her face from Peeta's view.

She heard her mom's quiet chuckle from beside her, but she ignored it as she busied herself with unnecessarily unloading everything in her backpack onto their wooden table. She watched Prim retrieve their first aid kit from the corner of her eye, and she willed the heat to go away as Prim began removing the bandages.

Both Prim and Peeta hissed when Peeta's wound was exposed. Katniss turned, letting the textbook in her hands fall to the tabletop with a thud.

Katniss' eyes widened as she inspected the cut for herself. It looked deep, even from the other side of the house. Peeta grew self-conscious in a way he hadn't been when the cut had been hidden beneath the bandage, twisting his arm so it couldn't be easily seen.

"It's bleeding again," Prim said. "Just a little."

She pressed a cloth onto the cut to stop the bleeding. Peeta winced at the contact before taking a deep breath and bracing himself.

"It doesn't look infected," Prim told him, "so that's a good thing at least. If I can put some antibiotic on it and a clean bandage, you should be fine."

She rummaged through in the first aid kit, pulling out a small jar. Opening it, she peered inside, judging how much was left and how much would be needed.

"There's plenty," she said loudly enough to ensure that both her mother and Katniss had heard her.

Prim went over to the sink and washed her hands. Coming back to Peeta, she peeled away the cloth, dipped her fingers into the ointment jar, and began spreading a generous amount of it onto Peeta's wound.

Peeta winced as the medicine reacted on his skin, but his shoulders drooped a second later, the wrinkles in his brow softening out.

"Thank you," he said as Prim wrapped a fresh bandage around the wound.

"It's not a big deal," she said. "I love healing people."

Peeta smiled at her. Katniss felt her heart skip a beat as she looked on, and she shifted, uncomfortable with the feeling. She heard her mom let out another quiet chuckle, and she shot her a sharp glance. Mrs. Everdeen wasn't looking at her, though; she was also observing Peeta and Prim.

"Here are some bandages," Prim said, handing over what store-bought, disposable bandages they had to Peeta along with some tape to fasten them in place. "You'll want to change it if it becomes damp. I'd say at least a few times a day for now to be safe, but if the bandage has drainage when you remove it, then you can start doing it more often.

"Is there someone at home who can help you with it? It's hard to wrap a bandage with only one available hand."

Peeta winced before arranging his features into a look of near indifference.

"It'll be fine," he said.

Prim looked at him for a moment.

"I can do it," she said. "We can meet before and after school at least. But you can keep the bandages in case you need them."

Peeta gave her a small smile.

"Thank you," he said. "I'm honored to have you as my doctor, Miss Everdeen."

Prim blushed. Katniss had never seen her do that before.

If Peeta hadn't already had Prim in the palm of his hand, he'd sealed the deal.

"I should be going," he said, standing up. "My mom's expecting me at the bakery."

There was a sense of urgency when he mentioned his mother. His whole demeanor stiffened.

"Thank you again," he said when he'd reached the door.

He looked at Katniss, and though he tried to smile, it was strained when he saw the worry Katniss hadn't been able to disguise. As Peeta nodded at her awkwardly and walked through the door, Katniss was left staring after him.


	15. Chapter 15

Prim tended to Peeta's wound at least twice a day until it healed, but a scar remained and likely would for the rest of Peeta's life.

He'd shrugged it off as Katniss had begun to wonder about a couple of the other scars she had noticed dotting his skin. The same ones she hadn't given much thought in the past because most in their district had a few.

In the Capitol, they removed scars, if they were allowed to form at all. Even something as simple as acne didn't have to be remembered once it was gone. In Twelve, nothing worked like that. Anything strong enough to scar the skin would stick around forever.

The weather had grown warmer in District 12 by the time Prim declared Peeta fully healed, and tensions remained high as the time for the Quarter Quell grew nearer.

It didn't help Katniss' mood that Prim was placed on bedrest less than two weeks before the reaping.

Katniss had a perpetual headache that she had been working hard to conceal from her mother and sister, who would insist that she take a break from hunting, if not school as well. They couldn't afford that.

Not when Prim was sick. Not when, in two week's time, any one of the three of them could be reaped.

Her thoughts were on just such a scenario when she realized Peeta had approached her. Even when she was preoccupied, his heavy footsteps were unmistakable. Students milled about around them, not ready to go home for the day as they talked to their friends.

"Prim still sick?" Peeta asked, brow creased in concern.

"It'll probably be a few more days," Katniss said. "She's still not feeling good."

Peeta accepted the answer and silently began walking at Katniss' side as they headed for the Seam. He had long since learned the way to the Everdeens' house, and he walked easily at Katniss' side, turning right or left when she turned, without either of them having to direct the other.

Katniss waited until the crowd of students had fallen behind them before she spoke again.

"I don't know what we'll do if she's not better by the reaping. We can't carry her bed to the Justice Building, and she might have trouble standing for so long."

"We could try to take her bed," Peeta quipped, getting a small grin out of Katniss. "Between you, me, and Gale we might be able to make it. We could probably count on Rory to help too. I get the impression there's something there."

Katniss turned to Peeta with wide eyes as she tried to piece together what he had said.

"Prim and Rory?" she asked. "Really?"

Peeta gave a short laugh.

"No one's told me anything, but I figure so. He wasn't subtle about it the few times I met him, but I couldn't read Prim as easily."

"Why didn't you tell me that before?"

Katniss felt a rush of adrenaline at the thought of someone being interested in dating her sister, even if Rory was a Hawthorne.

"Does Gale know about this?" Katniss asked more forcefully than she'd intended.

"You'll have to ask him that," Peeta said. "If he does, he hasn't mentioned it to me. And like I said, I could be wrong anyway. I hardly know Rory."

"Gale works so much these days that he wouldn't have noticed," she admitted. "He doesn't get to see Rory much."

Peeta watched her for a moment.

"I'm sure Rory would have hid it from him anyway. You don't usually want your older brother to know you like someone. I should know."

Katniss raised an eyebrow, but Peeta had sped up and was a few steps ahead of her. Katniss quickened her stride to match his until they were side-by-side again.

"How is Gale?" Peeta asked. "I haven't seen him around in weeks."

It wasn't as if Katniss had seen him much more. Only being able to speak to Gale once a week was growing odder the longer it went on. She felt more distant from him than she had since their friendship had formed.

"As fine as can be expected," was her reply.

She'd moved past the desire to keep Peeta and Gale separate entities in her life. She'd been in the woods with the two of them together several times and had found it less excruciating than she'd been anticipating.

The two boys had formed a strange friendship since then, though they never went out of their way to spend time together, and Katniss would have been lying if she said that it didn't leave her feeling relieved.

"He's been," she struggled to find the right words, "preoccupied, I think."

"In what way?" Peeta asked.

Katniss was surprised that his interest appeared genuine. She hadn't been sure he'd care to hear about Gale's theories.

"He says there's talk," she emphasized the word carefully, "in the mines."

"Dangerous talk?" Peeta asked, a strange look in his eye as he glanced around them for possible eavesdroppers.

Katniss nodded, looking away.

"That's interesting," Peeta said slowly.

Katniss had trouble interpreting his tone. She raised an eyebrow in question, and he shrugged.

"I've been thinking a lot about that kind of thing since the Victory Tour. You remember when I told you something was up with Marvel, right? We were never going to be the only people in Panem who realized something was off with him."

"You think it's connected? Marvel and the talk in the mines?"

District 1 was farther from District 12 than any of the other districts, both in physical distant and in lifestyle. It was hard to believe that they could have a connection of any sort.

"Maybe. Something's happening that's bigger than Twelve. There has to be."

"Why does there have to be?" Katniss asked, fear causing her voice to rise to a dangerous volume for the conversation.

Peeta looked around again to make sure no one was in earshot, but he didn't try to temper her as she continued.

"Why can't this just be an isolated problem in the mines? Who's to say it's happening somewhere else too?"

"No one," Peeta replied, watching Katniss closely to gauge her reaction. "I don't know anything more than you do. I'm just curious about it. With the Quarter Quell, it felt like Snow was trying to scare as many people as possible. Absolutely everyone will be in that reaping, and for all the talk of the Quells being set in stone seventy-five years ago, I don't believe it.

"Why would he need to scare the districts like that? He's trying to remind us who has the power to destroy us. It makes sense, right?"

"But you don't have any evidence for it," Katniss said. "There's nothing proving this wasn't the Quell that was always in that envelope. You're just going on about a hunch."

"Right," Peeta allowed, "and it's not like I have tons of experience predicting rebellions, but it feels right."

He paused, eyes flickering around once more before he continued.

"There was something else. Mayor Undersee has been in the bakery a few times recently, and he looks bad."

Katniss' mind flashed to Mayor Undersee's wife, picturing the man in a similar, sickly condition.

"What do you mean?"

"Something's bothering him," Peeta said. "Something serious. Even my mom asked him if he was alright last time she saw him, and she never bothers with things like that. I think the Capitol has been putting pressure on him. Maybe they know about the talk in the mines, or maybe they're just worried about that sort of talk starting in Twelve. Either way, I think it's getting to Mayor Undersee."

Katniss hadn't seen the man in ages. She thought about how Madge had been acting at school, but she couldn't detect any difference in her behavior. That didn't mean much. Katniss hadn't known the true extent of Mrs. Undersee's illness until she'd seen the woman for herself. It was doubtful that Madge would have been more forthcoming about any troubles her father was facing.

"The Capitol never bothers us," Katniss said. "Why start? Even if there was talk of a rebellion, it's not going to start here. The other districts are more dangerous. They have more people. Some of them have weapons."

Twelve was always the afterthought. Even when it came to peacekeepers, they were given the most useless of the bunch. The inexperienced or the ones who had proven they couldn't live up to the expectations in other districts. Katniss wouldn't have considered the lax security a bad thing. It did, however, show how little the Capitol cared about what they got up to out in the distant reaches of Panem.

"That might be what makes us so dangerous. We have the least to lose," Peeta said. "But I think it's more likely that they've gone on high alert with every district. If something was up with Marvel, then it's not far fetched to believe the other victors know about it, is it? And every district has victors who could talk."

Katniss snorted, having found the one possible bit of humor in the situation.

"Haymitch Abernathy isn't stirring up a rebellion," she said, taking a step closer as she lowered her voice. "Who would listen to an old drunk like him?"

"I don't think anyone's decided Haymitch is the one they want to follow into battle, but that doesn't mean he can't encourage people to rebel. All he needs to do is get the conversation going."

While much of what Peeta had said sounded plausible, Katniss couldn't picture Haymitch sneaking around the district to radicalize people when he had a hard enough time standing on his own two feet without swaying.

"Anything that comes out of Abernathy's mouth sounds ridiculous," Katniss said. "He's a drunk who can rant about taking down the Capitol all day long, but no one's going to believe it's anything more than nonsense."

"They don't have to buy his words completely for them to have an effect. All he would need to do is get the idea of rebellion in their heads, and then their own dissatisfaction would do the rest for him. The Capitol distracts us, keeps us focused on survival to keep us from doing something drastic, but all it takes is the power of suggestion to get people to want a change. And once it starts, I don't think it'll stop until real change happens. For better or worse."

Katniss shook her head, not feeling in control of her emotions. Ice had coated her insides.

"Stop talking like war is inevitable," she whispered.

Peeta frowned, his eyes unable to meet hers out of guilt, but he didn't back down.

"Have you thought about how we're never taught about the history of the world before Panem?" he asked.

He didn't wait for Katniss' answer.

"Our history classes begin with the destruction of the old world and the creation of the new one by the survivors. We get told the names of the old countries, but we don't know anything else about them except how they were destroyed."

It was true that Katniss could easily have recounted what happened to the old countries of the world. The climate had spun out of control, and the governments had followed. The oceans rose, overtaking the coasts. Violent storms sped the destruction along. The air grew warm, and crops stopped growing, reducing the size of the population. Disease had flourished as people grew weaker. Then the governments had thrown in the towel and given up, leaving a new small group to pull the fragments back together.

North America had been lucky compared to other areas of the world. Other places had faced far more devastation, whether it was because of their climate, local landscape, or other hardships they had already been fighting.

The people who had been left in this area of the world had banded together, with some willing to turn over power to others if it meant stability. They hadn't sensed what the future would hold then, just as they hadn't fully believed the disasters were coming until it was too late to stop them.

Katniss had never, not once, bothered to think about what those countries had been like before they were destroyed. It had never felt important.

"Does anyone know?" she asked. "Most of the information from those days is gone. No one has bothered to remember."

"Do you really believe the Capitol wasn't able to save more than it lets on?" Peeta asked hesitantly. "In the grand scheme of things, it hasn't been that long since the great disasters. Not everything could be lost."

Peeta was doing an excellent job of looking everywhere except at Katniss, who had narrowed her eyes at him. They weren't walking anymore. At some point, Katniss had stopped to stare at her companion, and Peeta had followed suit.

"What are you saying?" she asked.

"My family has this book," Peeta admitted. "It's been handed down for years, and it's old and yellow. My mom doesn't know about it because Dad's scared what she'd do with it, but he showed it to me and my brothers sometimes when we were kids. He said it was important. It's an old history book from before Panem existed. There's nothing about the great disasters in there, but it does talk a lot about the history of the United States."

That was the country that the land of District 12 had once been part of. Katniss could remember that much.

"What does the book say?" Katniss asked, trying to ignore the fear that sat heavily in her stomach.

"The United States was formed through a revolution," Peeta said voice heavy with the responsibility of sharing the information he held. "There were people here before that. The book calls them Native Americans, and they kept their own nations within the United States. I guess that when Panem was formed, they made them forget about those nations just as they made the rest of us forget about the United States and the others. The United States government was formed by people who crossed the ocean from Europe. They came from a number of countries, and they settled all of North America, killing huge numbers of the Natives and developing their own governments here. But the countries they'd come from in Europe controlled them here too. They said that this land was part of their own countries."

"That sounds just like the Capitol," Katniss said. "I thought you were going to tell me that things were perfect back then, but you're making it sound like it was only the same."

Peeta grimaced.

"Yeah, admittedly, a lot of it's not pretty, but the history book makes it sound like it got better later on."

"Who was writing it?" Katniss asked. "Our textbooks make Panem look pretty great too."

"Point taken," Peeta said, rubbing the back of his neck. "But I'm not trying to convince you that the United States was an amazing place to live."

"Then what are you trying to convince me of exactly?"

"Eventually, the people living in what became the United States—the European people that is—were fed up with being ruled over because people all the way in Europe couldn't have their best interests in mind. So they rebelled. And, Katniss, they won. The European countries recognized them as a their own country, and they even became allies later on. If that's not a successful revolution, then I don't know what it.

"And they did all that even though the Europeans were supposed to be stronger than they were," Peeta continued. "They managed it because they were committed and had nothing to lose. Who does that remind you of?"

"Us," Katniss said reluctantly. "But what about the Native Americans you mentioned before? All these people came and took their land. They had to have tried fighting them off too. How did that go?"

She had already guessed the answer, but Peeta's face falling confirmed it.

"They did try to fight for their land," Peeta said. "But they got put on pieces of land called reservations. It was supposed to be the worst land, and for a while, they weren't allowed to leave the reservations without permission. That changed later, but yeah, by then a lot of the damage couldn't be easily undone. But I'm not saying that Panem should be like the United States. I'm only saying that rebelling can work."

"People die in wars."

"Yeah, but at least they die for something," he said quietly. "If it weren't for that book, I wouldn't understand why the Capitol doesn't share the old history with us in school. It's not because it's unimportant. Did you know Mexico had a revolution too? To get rid of a different European country that was controlling them? I don't know as much about it because the book focuses more on the United States, but they did.

"And people used to speak different languages in Panem, but those became illegal before the rebellion that started the Hunger Games. Can you believe that?"

Katniss' mind was running a mile a minute. She felt ambushed by Peeta's sudden interest in a possible rebellion that was so like what Gale had admitted to fantasizing about. She'd thought that Peeta, at least, wouldn't get such dangerous thoughts in his head.

She hoped that neither boy began to discuss their own ideas with each other. A shiver traveled down her spine at the thought.

"This is dangerous," she said for what felt like the millionth time.

She turned from Peeta and kept walking, her head down as images of what could happen if a war broke out flashing through her mind.

"You can't keep talking about this," she said, voice hardly loud enough for Peeta to hear as he hurried to stay by her side.

"I don't plan to share it with anyone but you," he said quietly. "I didn't even plan to tell you really. It just came out."

He paused, struggling over the next words that he wanted to say.

"I trust you. I don't trust anyone else enough to share this."

Katniss froze with one foot hovering above the ground. She looked at Peeta, and he looked so vulnerable in that moment that she felt vulnerable in turn. She didn't know what to do or say, could only stand there as possible responses ran through her head.

"You _can_ trust me," she said.

He gave her a small, thankful smile.

"And I don't want war," he said quietly. "Do I dream of living in a safer place where I can go wherever I want and eat a decent meal? Sure, but I don't want to die. I don't want people I love to die, and I'm willing to play the Capitol's game if it means keeping people safe."

Katniss felt tears prick at her eyes, and she turned from him to conceal them, carrying on walking.

 **A/N: Word count: 3,169**


	16. Chapter 16

"Do you want to go with me into the woods today?" Katniss asked Peeta out of nowhere.

Prim hadn't yet disappeared into the house, and she glanced over her shoulder with a small grin on her lips, quickening her footsteps to close the door behind herself as quickly as possible.

Though Peeta had been going into the woods with Katniss frequently over the recent months, it had always been him who requested to go. Katniss had never offered to bring him along even as she'd grown to enjoy his company, and her offer had him frozen in place as he watched her.

Katniss wasn't sure why she needed him along. She didn't want to ask Peeta the questions whirling around her head. She wanted to keep them to herself. Yet she couldn't shake the desire to have Peeta close, to have the opportunity to ask her questions if the desire to do so became too much to handle and she couldn't hold back.

"Sure," Peeta said cautiously, as if he expected Katniss to take back her offer once he agreed to it. "I think I can do that. I'll tell my dad that the wrestling club decided to practice at the last minute."

Katniss nodded. It wasn't the first time Peeta had used that lie, but his father always accepted it. She suspected the man knew it wasn't true, but his wife had to be buying it if Peeta kept using it. The woman had enough pride that she wouldn't pull Peeta from a wrestling practice.

Peeta hurried back down the dirt road toward the merchant quarter, and Katniss found herself unable to stop watching him as he went. It wasn't until his figure had disappeared around a corner that she let herself inside the house.

She dumped her bag on the table, not looking at Prim or her mother until she realized it was strangely quiet. She whipped her head around, almost expecting to find herself alone, but they were both there, sitting on the edge of one of the beds and watching her with smiles on their faces. Prim was bobbing with repressed energy, making the mattress squeak.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" Katniss snapped, her eyes narrowing at them.

Her mother only continued to smile at her, but Prim devolved into giggles, wriggling around as if she couldn't contain herself.

"You and Peeta are cute together," she said as if she'd been bursting to say the words and couldn't help herself any longer.

Katniss stared at her in horror, struggling to come up with a denial that they didn't look cute together because there was no 'together,' but she couldn't remember what words she was meant to use for that sort of thing. Instead, turning her face away from them, she slipped off her school shoes and put on her hunting boots before heading out the door, not casting a glance back in the direction of her family.

Peeta was already waiting for her when she got to the weak area of the fence they typically used. The clothes he wore to the woods had changed over time. At first, he'd worn whatever he had worn to school that day, even if it wasn't ideal for trekking through a forest. Now he wore clothes that must have been what he'd previously worn while working in the bakery, where getting dirty was a requirement of the job.

She averted her eyes, looking instead at the fence. Without saying a word to Peeta, she leaned close, listening for the hum that would warn them of electricity.

"I've already checked," Peeta said. "It's not on."

In all their trips so far, it had been Katniss who checked.

She didn't question him as she slipped under the fence, and she didn't glance over her shoulder as Peeta followed her. Despite his acquired experience with the woods, his footsteps were as loud as they'd always been, and she found that it had become comforting to know he was behind her.

Whenever he paused, Katniss stopped to see what it was that had captured his attention. Some of the time it was an animal, but that was rare. He was far more likely to stop and inspect a plant. Since Katniss had first put him in charge of collecting them, Peeta had taken his job seriously, with his knowledge of the various flora around Twelve increasing exponentially.

Katniss thought his knowledge would eclipse hers soon. For years, she'd relied on the book her father had given her, but Peeta was intent on exploring, poking at flowers that Katniss had never bothered with because they weren't in the book.

Peeta never gathered them, unwilling to be a test subject for something that could have been deadly poisonous for all they knew, but he did memorize their appearance, smell, and anything else he could. He tried to work out their names from what information he had, and if he couldn't, he tried naming them himself.

The first time he'd stooped over a flower, Katniss turned around, a sigh escaping her lips. He was already crouching down, reaching out to run his finger against the leaves of a plant that Katniss hadn't noticed. It was small and rather hard to spot amongst its neighbors, but Peeta had spotted it with a sharpness that he hadn't possessed several months ago.

"I like this one," he commented, keeping his voice hushed as he often did in the woods whether Katniss was trying to track an animal or not.

Katniss scowled at the plant. It was wholly unremarkable, and even if it had been edible, there wasn't enough there for it to make a large difference.

"Why?" she asked, distaste rolling off her her tongue with the word.

Peeta didn't look sheepish as he once might have when Katniss used that tone. He offered her a wry smile before looking back at the plant.

"That," he pointed a finger at Katniss, "is exactly what impresses me. There's something nice about it going along not caring if others appreciate it or not."

Katniss raised an eyebrow.

"None of the plants here care if they're appreciated or not. They're plants."

Another smile from Peeta. Before he responded, he stood, placing his hands on his thighs as he pushed himself up. He looked at Katniss with a slight tilt of his head, and the gaze made her shift. She kept her own eyes on the plant that had captured Peeta's attention.

"They kind of have to care, don't they?" he asked, only making Katniss' confusion stronger. "Maybe not like humans, but most of them need some kind of creature to pay attention. Like all the flowers that have to attract bees. They're making themselves appreciated."

That wasn't how Katniss viewed the process. It was like when Prim insisted that Buttercup and Lady felt emotions like people did. Katniss had no doubt that they felt something, and Buttercup had a level of intelligence that made him far more annoying than he would have been otherwise. Still, they couldn't feel at least half of the emotions Prim often claimed they did.

She wasn't surprised that Peeta would be the same way.

"Still," she said, "if you want to look at flowers, there are prettier plants to look at."

Peeta laughed out loud, putting the plant behind him and continuing along their path, this time at Katniss' side.

"And I look at those plants all the time," he said. "There's no reason I can't appreciate all of them."

Katniss made a concerted effort to look anywhere but at Peeta. She was aware of how close he was. It was no closer than Gale often got when they walked together, but there was something different about it being Peeta. Her heart pounded in her chest in a similar way to how it did so when she encountered the rare coyote or bobcat that ran around the woods. She wasn't sure why Peeta would create such a response in her, as he held no danger.

They kept walking, with Peeta following Katniss' lead. He asked no questions about where they were heading even once he realized that they were going farther than Katniss had taken him before.

She wasn't sure when she had decided she was taking him to the lake, but somewhere along the path she had realized that was where her feet were taking her, and she hadn't stopped or turned in a different direction.

When the lake came into view through the trees, Peeta let out a long exhale. Katniss risked a glance at him for the first time since they'd last spoken out loud. She continued to watch him as he stepped in front of her, sensing that they'd reached their destination. His eyes roved from one part of the lake to another, taking in the beach and the water and the small shed.

"This is incredible," he said quietly.

Katniss could barely hear the words, but she hummed in agreement. She took a step towards Peeta's back, looking at the calm water that he was staring out over. No matter how she felt when she arrived at the lake, the water always made her feel peaceful. She'd go for a swim and end up floating on her back until her fingers grew so pruned that staying in was no longer an option.

She wouldn't be swimming with Peeta. The idea of it was enough to make her flush, but she liked the idea of sharing the way the lake made her feel. She didn't dare tell him that not even Gale knew about the lake. Not only had Katniss never led him here, she'd also purposefully led him away from it on more than one occasion.

Peeta crouched, taking a seat on the sandy bank. The ground was soft and sure to leave traces on their clothes, but Katniss didn't let that stop her from following him. Peeta reached out to dip his hand in the water, moving it around as if it were fundamentally different than water he'd encountered before. Katniss had to remind herself that no one in District 12 had seen a lake except herself. Not in person.

"What is this place?" he asked.

"A lake," she said slowly.

Surely, Peeta had heard of them. They made frequent appearances in the games after all, and they'd studied the "great" ones in northern Panem a number of times.

Peeta snorted, shaking his head as his cheeks turned a light pink.

"No, I know that much," he said. "That wasn't what I meant."

Katniss felt her own embarrassment tie a knot in her stomach.

"My dad used to bring me here," she said carefully. "He taught me how to swim and how to fish. And he explained why he convinced my mom to name me Katniss."

She motioned at one of the plants growing on the edge of the lake. Peeta followed her gesture, staring at the plant with curiosity. They had encountered it together before along the sides of the streams that ran through the woods, but she'd found herself calling them by the other names to avoid the subject of them being her namesake.

It was ridiculous, but Katniss felt self-conscious about it, as if any faults Peeta found in the plant would be reflective of her as well. She stiffened as Peeta stood and moved closer to the clump of flowers, leaning in to inspect them.

"You can eat them, right?" Peeta asked, turning back to look at her.

It took a moment for the distracted Katniss to nod.

"This isn't the best time of year for them" she said, "but you can dig up the bulbs and eat them. Like potatoes. I usually come out here and spend a day digging them up. You have to be careful because if you dig up too many than you have no more plants for the next year."

Peeta looked back down at the plants. He gripped one by the stem just underneath the flower and tilted it towards him. After a few moments, he released it, his eyes beginning to rove over the expanse of the lake once again.

"You said your dad taught you how to swim?" Peeta asked.

"Yes," she replied. "That was why he first brought me out here. He said the lake would be funner if he had someone to share it with. He'd taught himself how to swim because his grandmother had told him about how swimming used to be when she was at her happiest."

Katniss kept her gaze on the opposite shore of the lake, though she felt Peeta turn to look at her instead of the water.

"She was a kid before the rebellion, before the games. I guess there was no fence then. Anyone who wanted could come out here to the lake. Dad took it on himself to understand her, and then he wanted to share it with me."

"That sounds amazing," Peeta said with a quiver in his voice. "My family never told any stories from," he hesitated over what to call it, "before. I don't think my parents have any idea what our ancestors were doing back then."

Katniss tried to shrug it off.

"My dad thought it was important, but all I know is how to swim. It's not like I could tell you what else anyone was up to back then."

Peeta was silent, but Katniss could feel his eyes on her. Eventually, she forced herself to glance at him. He was watching her with a smile, but when she turned to face him, he looked away.

"It's more than I have," he said. "I couldn't swim to save my life."

"I could teach you," Katniss offered before she'd had the chance to think the offer through.

It would be easier than reteaching him how to walk.

Peeta's eyes widened. The way he looked at the water morphed into something more akin to fear than the wonder he'd been showing before.

"Maybe later," he said. "Right now I'm fine with appreciating the view."

XXX

The sun was beginning to set as they made their way back to Twelve. Katniss couldn't help but count down the days to the reaping in her head. With the end of the day, they had less than a week.

"You okay?" Peeta asked, his words barely making it into Katniss' awareness.

She gave a short nod, not trusting herself to speak when her mind was still on the games.

Peeta was watching her with a furrowed brow, his head tilted to one side as he analyzed her, undoubtedly intense, expression. Katniss tried to mold her features into something neutral, but it was difficult.

"I was thinking," she said when it became clear that Peeta wasn't going to look away.

They slipped under the fence with no one in sight on either side.

The district was as quiet as it typically was these days.

Weekdays meant most of the working age adults were down in the mines, but even then, those not employed in the mines could often be seen ambling around the district, completing errands or meeting with friends. It was rare for the district to feel as quiet as it had recently, as everyone barricaded themselves in their homes and prepared for the possibility of being taken from their lives.

The meadow that the fence occupied showed none of that anxiety. It had blossomed as it always did, with the familiar dandelions scattered throughout the green grass. This was one of the few places where life flourished in Twelve. There was nothing about the land's composition or resources that limited the growth of the wildflowers here. Katniss had picked countless dandelions, yet they always came back as tenacious as ever.

Peeta saw her looking at the small yellow flowers, ones they had mentioned before but had never explored in the detail they had countless other plants that littered the woods. The dandelions were too mundane to be a focus.

Stooping down, Peeta snapped the stem of one of the flowers. He straightened back up and held the flower out to a shocked Katniss, who could do little but stare at him for a moment. When she reached out to take the flower, it was with hesitation.

She twirled it between her fingers with a frown.

"What's wrong?" Peeta asked, worry lacing his voice.

Katniss glanced up at him, though it wasn't a look that did anything to boost Peeta's confidence.

"Nothing," she said. "It's just that…"

She hesitated. Never before had she told anyone about the memory, and she wasn't sure she wanted Peeta to be the first to know.

Yet, in that moment, she felt that she was bursting to tell him, and the words came out in an inelegant jumble that she couldn't stop.

"Dandelions remind me of you," she said, once again looking at the flower, not Peeta.

"Why is that?" Peeta asked, his voice trembling in anticipation.

There was a new tension between them that was unlike anything Katniss had experienced before. It left her body feeling like it was vibrating.

"Do you remember the bread?" she asked without elaboration.

In some ways, it might have been a test. If he remembered, then that meant more than Katniss wanted to admit.

Peeta's posture straightened when she said the words, but his answer wasn't forthcoming.

"What bread?" he asked, and it was only when Katniss' face fell and shoulders deflated that he hastened to add. "Do you mean the bread I was supposed to feed to the pigs?"

It became easier for Katniss to breathe.

"What other bread would I be talking about?" she asked with narrowed eyes.

"Well, I did grow up in a bakery," Peeta attempted to joke, but when Katniss only looked at him, he sighed. "I remember that bread," he said seriously. "I didn't think _you_ remembered it though."

"Peeta," Katniss said, "I was close to starving to death. How could I have forgotten that bread?"

"I don't know," he said. "We didn't exactly talk that day. I wasn't betting on you remembering that it was me who gave it to you."

Ever since that day, there had been a small fear in Katniss' mind that Peeta would force her to return a favor in return for that bread. It had flared again when he'd begun hanging around her family, and had only recently lessened. The idea that he hadn't expected her to even remember it was so far out of the realm of Katniss' expectations that she didn't know how to process it.

She looked back down at the dandelion. She had gripped it too tightly in her fingers, and it drooped over her hand where the stem had been damaged.

"After that day, I still wasn't sure how I was going to feed Prim," she said. "I was happy to have that bread, but I knew that, after we ate it, we'd go back to starving. Then I saw you in the schoolyard. I looked down, and there were dandelions at my feet. That was when I remembered you can eat them, that _we_ could eat them. I picked some that night, and as I did, I remembered everything my dad had taught me. I hadn't thought that I could go into the woods by myself. You were what made me go."

For a long moment, Peeta said nothing. Katniss occupied herself by twirling the flower between her thumb and forefinger, watching it droop more and more as she did so.

"Why did you do it?" she asked suddenly. When Peeta looked at her in confusion, she added, "Give me the bread. Why did you do it?"

Peeta cringed, but though he wasn't eager to look her in the eye, he answered her truthfully.

"I knew your dad had died, and it was obvious you needed help. It was the right thing to do."

Katniss shook her head as she spoke, unaware that she was doing so.

"You could have pretended you hadn't seen me. It's what most people would have done, and I wouldn't have thought any differently."

"I would have hated myself," he said quietly. "When I saw you through the window and realized that I could do something, there was no way I couldn't."

He hesitated. The bakery was in sight, but neither of them were moving towards it anymore.

"On the first day of kindergarten, my dad pointed you out to me," he said.

His cheeks were turning a light shade of pink, and Katniss' brow creased as she watched him.

"You were there with your mom and dad and even Prim. Your hair was in these pigtails. My dad said that he'd wanted to marry your mom, but she'd fallen in love with your dad instead. He said it was because your dad had a beautiful voice when he sang. It was the first time my dad had said something like that, so I was curious, but you didn't seem to want to be friends with anyone. I wasn't brave enough to ask you to play.

"Then, during class, you got up in front of everyone to sing, and I understood exactly what my dad had meant. I knew that, if your dad's voice was anything like yours, then my dad never stood a chance."

Katniss' throat was tight.

Her father's voice and the songs he would sing were usually kept safely stored away, only to be taken out when it was safe to do so.

"You noticed me on the first day of school?" she asked.

"I did," Peeta said, his voice thick with an emotion Katniss couldn't make sense of.

She fiddled with the drawstring on the bag she carried.

They were walking again, this time in silence. Upon reaching the bakery, Peeta took the stairs to the front door before pausing and looking back at her.

"I didn't weird you out, did I?" he asked.

This time Katniss could identify the emotion in his voice as fear. She tried to smile, but she felt how strained it was. He would have to trust that her words were genuine. Even if she wasn't sure of that herself.

"No," she said. "I'm just surprised. I never thought anyone would have cared that much."

Peeta snorted, a grin lifting his lips in a way that left Katniss feeling relieved.

"Plenty of people care," he said. "You're all that some people can talk about. You're the girl brave enough to go into the woods, to hunt and break the law. Most of the people at school idolize you. They want to _be_ you."

There was no way that that was true. If it were, the other students wouldn't look away from her when she walked past them in the hallway. They wouldn't have looked at her with such suspicion anytime a teacher called on her to speak in class.

"I think you're exaggerating," she said.

Peeta laughed, shaking his head.

"I'm really not, but you'll have to trust me. If they seem like they don't like you, it's because you're so impressive that you intimidate them. They're scared you'll pummel them into the ground or something if they speak to you."

Katniss raised an eyebrow. She'd killed numerous animals, of course, but she'd never done anything remotely violent to a human being. She also didn't make it a regular habit to insult anyone, so she wasn't sure why someone would see her as intimidating. It sounded laughable.

"They hardly know I exist," she said.

"They do know. Trust me."

Peeta disappeared through the bakery door, and Katniss stood looking through the large glass window. In that moment, she'd forgotten that she could be just as easily seen from the other side, but it didn't matter. No one in the bakery was paying her any attention.

She watched as Peeta ambled behind the counter, pointedly ignoring the hostile looks of his mother. He tugged an apron off its hook and wrapped it around his waist, saying a few words to his mother before he disappeared into the back. Mrs. Mellark's scowl only deepened once he was gone. She was leaning against the counter, arms crossed in boredom.

With a sigh, Katniss headed down the street, more interested in the ground than what was happening around her. The dandelion was still in her hand. She'd almost forgotten about it. Its stem was no longer supporting any of its weight, but the flower was intact.

It wouldn't be for long, she knew, but she wasn't sure how long it would take for the bud to shrivel. She'd never kept a dandelion around for that long.

Perhaps she should have tossed it onto the ground and let nature have its way with it. She could have picked a few more and brought them home with the other plants they'd gathered that day. It wasn't as if Peeta had worked hard to give this one to her.

She couldn't bring herself to do anything like that though. Instead, she slipped the flower into the pocket of her pants, being as gentle as she could with it. Perhaps it could stay in her pocket and die its slow death there. Out of sight where it wouldn't plague her thoughts.


	17. Chapter 17

There was a chill in the air the morning of the reaping that was unlike a typical summer morning. Katniss knew she wasn't the only one who felt it.

There was a hush about the house as the Everdeens prepared themselves for the event. Katniss slipped on the dress she'd worn for several reapings in a row. It was shorter on her than it had been the first time she'd worn it, but it was long enough that she wasn't concerned. Prim's dress was newer due to a growth spurt, and the young girl itched at herself, though she didn't complain.

Their mother was more dressed up than she usually was for a reaping. She had braided her own hair, not just Katniss', before she'd made breakfast.

When they left the house, there were already people streaming down the street in the direction of the square. No one said a word except for a few of the youngest children who were grumpy about this departure from their routine. A few of them had tears streaming down their faces that weren't for the true horrors of the day.

Katniss felt ice coat her stomach at the thought of one of those crying children being reaped. Some of them would have no idea what was happening, no matter how their parents had tried to prepare them. Bile rose in her throat, and she struggled to keep it down. It wouldn't do to be reaped in a vomit-stained dress.

They were still separated by age and gender when they arrived in the square. It was laughable, really, the multitude of barricades that had been set up to divide them by age and gender. Mrs. Everdeen hugged them both and disappeared down the line, a couple decades worth of people between them.

Katniss knelt down to Prim's eye level.

"It'll be alright," she said, voice cracking, before she pulled Prim in for a hug.

The younger girl gripped her tightly, and Katniss almost had to yank her off to get away. Katniss took her to meet the peacekeepers standing outside the thirteen-year-old entrypoint and cringed as they took her blood sample. Then Prim was gone, and the peacekeepers were pushing her away.

Katniss felt as if she were suffocating once she'd been pushed into the corral for seventeen-year-old girls. Gale was too far away to see, if he was there yet. Peeta should have been close by, among the boys in the corral next to hers, but she didn't see him. She pushed herself forward, following the bar that separated them from the boys their age. Eventually, she made it to the front, not having found Peeta but instead Madge leaning against the barricade that separated them from the stage.

She gave Katniss a sad attempt at a smile when she saw her. The difference in their statuses was more noticeable than it was at school. Madge's dress looked newer, with no wear or tear. It was that bright shade of white that was nearly impossible to achieve once clothing had been washed more than a few times.

"It's ironic, isn't it?" Madge said. "Me having to stand in here while my dad is on stage. Even Mom's in the barricades for this one."

She said it with a dark humor that was unlike Madge, rolling her eyes at the peacekeepers who were already guarding the stage.

"Is your dad's name in?" Katniss asked.

"Yes. The Capitol made it clear that it would be after the Quarter Quell announcement. They told him to have everything in order in case he was reaped. They want an easy transition if they have to appoint a new mayor."

Katniss was only half paying attention, having finally spotted Peeta in the crowd.

He was close to the front in a cluster of merchant kids. They were talking and trying to distract each other, but it didn't seem to be working if their frequent glances at the empty stage were anything to go by. If he'd noticed Katniss in the next barricade over, then Peeta wasn't letting on. His brow was furrowed and his lips turned downward. Though he angled himself toward his friends as they spoke, he didn't react to anything being said.

Katniss longed to talk to him, but the fence was in her way, and she didn't dare shout for him in the crowd. Just the thought of it made a blush creep up her neck.

She turned away from him to find Madge watching her, a small grin on her lips.

"What?" Katniss snapped.

Madge shrugged and had the decency to turn to face the stage as if something were about to happen. Katniss sighed in relief.

There was a cruel irony in how time passed based on your anticipation for coming events. Though Katniss swore they'd gotten to the square far ahead of the designated start time, Mayor Undersee chose to appear on stage not long after Madge and Katniss had stopped talking and begun to worry in silence.

"Good evening, fellow citizens," the man announced, a bright expression painted on his face.

Madge hunched over the bars, watching her father with the same detached expression as everyone else. She didn't join the return greeting that some gave the mayor.

"Today, we celebrate another reaping," he continued, voice echoing around the square. "Please welcome, Ms. Effie Trinket."

There was scattered applause as the aforementioned woman stopped her glaring at Haymitch, who had been seated beside her, and tottered to the microphone on her stilettos. Her smile was strained as she looked at the crowd.

"Welcome, welcome to the reaping of the 75th Annual Hunger Games."

She paused for applause that didn't come.

"And the 3rd Quarter Quell," she exclaimed, throwing her arms in the air in celebration.

There was another pause, and again, Effie received nothing but silence. Her face twitched so violently that Katniss could see it from her place in the barricades, but the woman was good at forcing a smile onto her face again.

"As Mayor Undersee said, today we will discover who in this fine," the word visibly pained her to use, "district will have the honor of participating in a Quarter Quell."

She squealed before gigging, raising one hand to cover her mouth.

"Excuse me. It's just so exciting. A Quarter Quell."

When there was still no excitement from the crowd, she averted her eyes to look above them instead.

"As you know, today we will be selecting our tributes from the entire district. However, as always, we'll be drawing girls—excuse me, women _and_ girls—first."

She stuck her hand into one of the glass bowls. They were larger than usual, and even on her heels, Effie struggled to get her arm all the way to the bottom. She tossed the papers about before tugging one slip out, pinching it carefully between her index finger and thumb. She unfolded it at an agonizingly slow pace.

"Jonie Miletus," she announced with a triumphant smile.

The crowd was silent as they waited to see who stepped forward from their ranks. There was some commotion as the peacekeepers led a middle-aged woman out from one of the barricades.

Katniss couldn't remember having seen the woman before. She had the physique of one of the miners and wore a stone face that betrayed nothing as she walked towards the stage. If she had family or friends, none of them called out like they sometimes did for tributes. It was all for the better. People who yelled were sometimes punished.

Though she wanted to feel sorry for the woman, Katniss couldn't ignore her relief. Prim had only two slips of paper in that ball, but there was a part of Katniss that hadn't been able to believe she'd be safe until she was.

"Would you like to say a few words?" Effie asked the woman once she'd made it on stage.

Jonie did nothing but stare as Effie looked her up and down, judging the worn outfit that the woman might have worn to reapings as a teenager. After an uncomfortably long moment of silence, Effie tottered back to the microphone, her smile the most strained it had been yet.

"Exciting, exciting," she muttered. "Time to choose our male tribute. Who will it be?"

For a second, Katniss thought she might squeal again, but she was capable of holding it in as she approached the second bowl full of paper slips. She reached her hand in and swirled it around, mixing the names.

Katniss felt her heart hammer in her chest as she waited with baited breath. Effie drew it out for as long as she could without someone snapping.

"Paan Mellark."

Katniss sucked in a breath so sharply that she caught Madge's attention. Or maybe Madge had been turning to face her already. Katniss' mind was going a mile a minute, but she didn't have a second to spare for Madge.

Ironically, she wouldn't have had a clue that the name belonged to Peeta's oldest brother without the inclusion of the last name. She watched with sharp eyes as the man, who was hardly old enough to be considered a man, took his place on the stage. Jonie didn't look his way, and he did his best to ignore her as well.

While Jonie looked as if she felt nothing, Paan looked decidedly angry that this was to be his fate. It was an expression Katniss had never seen on Peeta's face, but it was obvious enough looking at them that they had little in common.

Effie didn't bother to ask Paan if he had anything to say.

"That concludes our annual reaping."

Effie clapped her hands and gave a short laugh, her genuine happiness returning once she'd allowed herself to think of the momentous task that was to face the two people that had been condemned to death.

"You'll be seeing them again in the Capitol," she said. "And, hopefully, one of them will be back in Twelve someday."

She threw out her arms grandly, this time not expecting to receive a response from the crowd. Katniss had expected someone to cheer from the relief it hadn't been them, but no one seemed inclined to do so. It was quiet as Effie smiled at them.

Just like that, Effie was shuffling her two charges off the stage. Paan shrunk away when she touched him with a carefully manicured hand, and Effie took a step back, scowling now that the Capitol cameras held no interest in her.

Haymitch and the mayor ambled after the group, with Haymitch swaying this way and that as he struggled not to fall over. Katniss rolled her eyes at him. As their mentor, Haymitch should have been Paan's and Jonie's best chance at survival, but Haymitch would spend the entirety of the games as drunk as he was the rest of the year. Katniss couldn't remember the last time a District 12 tribute had received a gift from sponsors.

With the door to the Justice Building closed, Katniss sucked up the courage to seek Peeta out. She found him as several peacekeepers led him out of the barricade, forcing others to stay behind and motioning for them to leave the barricades with everyone else.

Peeta's forehead was deeply creased. He didn't glance at Katniss as he was escorted around the stage. He didn't look at anyone, keeping his eyes focused on the ground beneath him. Even when his parents joined him, escorted by their own peacekeepers, he kept his head lowered.

Katniss was embarrassingly fascinated by the family's reaction. Ry, the middle brother, was biting at his lip as if keeping its tremble from being seen. Mr. Mellark's face was marked with more lines than Katniss had seen on it before. Mrs. Mellark's, on the other hand, was controlled, with no emotions to be found. Katniss wondered if she felt something for her oldest son or if the mask was, in fact, not a mask at all.

With the "festivities" over, the peacekeepers were eager to disperse the crowd. The metal fence in front of Katniss and Madge was carried away, and suddenly, no one was pressing in on Katniss the way they had been a minute earlier. Her breathing became easier, even as her heart pounded in her chest.

"What do we do now?" Katniss asked Madge, immediately regretting how strained her voice sounded.

It was as if speaking the question had broken something in her, and she felt tears stinging at her eyes. She blinked, but that only made them come faster. Madge pointedly turned away as Katniss reached up to swipe at the few that had escaped.

Madge looked torn as she glanced between her mother, who was making her way home without her husband at her side, and Katniss.

"Go help her," Katniss said, waving Madge off with one hand. "I'm fine. I'll wait for Peeta, see if he's okay?"

Madge's smile surprised Katniss, and the way the blonde girl stepped forward seconds later to envelop her in a hug only surprised her more. She stood stiffly until Madge released her, and for the first time, Katniss noticed there were tears in Madge's eyes too.

"If you can, tell him I'm sorry too," she said before hurrying off without waiting for a response.

Katniss watched her retreat, but she was lost in the crowd before she'd made it home.

Mind reeling with a hundred and one thoughts, Katniss headed towards the bakery, trusting her mother to find Prim and escort her home. It was closed, of course, just as every business in the district was to accommodate the reaping. Only the Capitol kept things going in full swing on the reaping, sitting down to their comfortable recaps in the evening after work.

When four figures appeared along the road that led to the Justice Building, Katniss stiffened. They were undeniably the Mellarks. The blond hair was a giveaway, and Katniss would have recognized Peeta's gait easily.

Mrs. Mellark stared straight ahead, not looking at where she was going. Her face was still the emotionless mask it had been when Katniss had last gotten a glimpse of her. The others looked sadder, but Katniss saw, as they got closer, that there were no signs that any of them had shed a tear.

Peeta was the first to notice her, one eyebrow rising at the sight of her on the bakery steps. She remained silent as they approached, as unsure as ever what she planned to say to Peeta. Mrs. Mellark glided past as if she hadn't noticed the Seam girl.

Mr. Mellark and Ry inclined their heads in her direction but followed after Mrs. Mellark without any other acknowledgement, which was all the better. Peeta lowered himself to sit beside her, making Katniss' heart pound in her chest.

She tried to look at him discreetly, but she found that difficult to do. Up close, it was obvious that he hadn't allowed himself to cry. His eyes didn't have the slightest hint of red. Katniss looked away from them quickly. Not that it mattered, Peeta wasn't looking at her anyway.

She didn't so much decide not to say anything as she failed to come up with words that felt adequate. Some of the weight in her stomach was lifted when Peeta was the first to speak.

"I didn't expect it to be any of my family," Peeta said. "Obviously, I knew it could be, but I didn't think it would be. Paan's never taken tessarae in his life. His chances weren't high. It's weird how probability works, how someone's chances can be low but it still happens.

"He was supposed to be safe," he continued. "All of them were. Now I think Mom's paranoid the Capitol is going to off her somehow, even though she's not going to the games. She told Paan not to do anything stupid that would 'set the Capitol after me.'"

He imitated his mother with a disgust that Katniss was surprised to hear from him. She glanced through the big glass window that revealed the goings on in the front of the bakery. Mrs. Mellark was the only one standing guard over the counter, the other two apparently taking care of other tasks in the back.

Mrs. Mellark was stone-faced as she stared at a random spot on the far wall.

No one was going to enter the bakery, not the same day as the reaping and potentially not for the entire length of the games. Mrs. Mellark realized this; it might have been what she was frowning about. But there was a tight set to her shoulders that hinted at her determination to act as if business would continue as usual.

Peeta had followed her gaze, his brow furrowed. He sighed as he looked away from his mother.

"He's gone. He's not coming back. My own brother will be thrown in that arena and killed, and I don't feel any more upset about it than I ever have anyone else reaped from Twelve. I just feel...nothing. I feel nothing."

His eyes widened. He took in a shallow, shaky breath.

"That's not normal," he said. "I should feel something. I should be upset. I should have volunteered. I should have cried. I should have—"

He cut himself off with a growl of frustration. He buried his face in his hands and began tugging at his hair in a state of agitation that Katniss had never seen him in before. She felt nauseous.

"You can't make yourself feel something," she said, surprised at the strength in her voice. "Would he have cried over you?"

Peeta didn't answer.

"Look at me," Katniss demanded.

If she'd allowed herself to think about it, she'd have been surprised with herself, but she couldn't be bothered to consider it. Peeta looked at her, staring with wide, surprised eyes.

"You don't have to die for anyone," Katniss said, trying to plow through without stopping to analyze how she felt. "No one has to die for anyone. If you choose to, then fine. I guess that can make someone a hero, but it's not something anyone _has_ to do. Your life isn't worth any less than your brother's. He doesn't deserve to live any more than you do."

Peeta stared at her for a moment, confounded. Once he'd been able to let the words settle, he nodded, though it wasn't in enthusiastic agreement.

"He's my brother," he said, voice scratchy.

"I wouldn't die for my mother," Katniss said as the truth of the sentiment hit her. "Lots of people probably would, but I wouldn't. Not even if I could save her from a painful death."

"That's different." Peeta's voice was little more than a whisper. "Parents are meant to sacrifice themselves for their children, not the other way around."

"But why are they?" Katniss interrupted. "I wouldn't expect my mom to die for me either. We can't all walk around dying for each other. That doesn't make any sense. Sometimes people die, and it's sad, but we shouldn't have been the ones to die instead. That's a stupid idea. I don't know why people think it's a good thing. How many of the tributes do you think have had siblings? Most of them? When was the last time you saw one of those siblings volunteer?"

He didn't answer; he didn't need to. Katniss knew as well as he did that it had never happened, at least not in their lifetimes. It was a grand idea, dying for your sibling, but no one ever did it.

"Maybe it doesn't make me a bad person," Peeta said. "But it certainly makes me less brave than you. You can talk around it all you want, but we both know you would have stepped onto that stage for Prim. That makes you an infinitely braver person than I'll ever be."

"Sacrificing yourself doesn't mean you're brave," Katniss said, voice shaking at the thought of Prim being reaped. "I think people are more likely to do it out of fear. If I volunteered, it would only be because I was scared."

She broke off, unable to say anything more from the tightness in her throat. Peeta watched her, pain on his own features.

Without saying another word, he held out his hand. Katniss felt her heart stutter as she looked at it. For a heartbeat, she wasn't sure what to do, but then, without allowing herself to overthink it, she reached out and clasped it in her own.

XXX

Re-watching Twelve's reaping each year always felt especially cruel. They'd lived through the terror once, and then they had to experience it again with commentary from the Capitol that went far beyond Effie Trinket's comments.

The people of the other districts looked as terrified as Twelve had been earlier that day. Several elderly people were escorted onto stages around Panem, and Katniss felt nausea that she couldn't shake no matter how many reapings they sat through.

It wasn't until District 6, though, that Katniss truly believed she had seen the worst moment of any reaping in her life.

The idea that a child younger than twelve could be reaped had been on her mind since Gale had raised the idea, but it had faded into the background as district after district passed without the situation occurring. Nine had reaped a ten-year-old, but Katniss had done a good job of convincing herself that the boy was practically twelve anyway.

When the boy from Six's name was called and peacekeepers had to carry a wailing and flailing three-year-old onto the stage, Katniss had to look away from the screen. She could hear the quiet cries of her sister and the gasps from her mother, but she tried her best to ignore them.

If the boy had family willing to step up for him, there was no evidence of it.

Katniss thought about her conversation with Peeta earlier in the day and wondered what he was thinking about the spectacle. He might have been more stunned than Katniss was to see the scene. For him, it would look needlessly cruel, but Katniss had already begun speculating. Did the boy's parents have other children who needed to be taken care of? Were they sacrificing the boy in the hope they could raise the others to adulthood? Or was the boy an orphan?

The commentators' faces appeared on screen, their smiles strained. The woman's eyes kept flickering somewhere off screen, unable to look at the camera for long. Katniss had never seen anyone from the Capitol look uncomfortable on television. They were always naturals at putting on fake smiles and acting overly enthusiastic no matter what was happening.

"That was a shock," Flickerman said, his voice flatter than usual.

There was another pause as Flickerman waited for his partner to speak. When she didn't, he carried on.

"I have to admit that I never expected a scene like that."

He tried to laugh at the end, but it wasn't as hearty as his usual guffaw. The woman looked between him and the camera, her mouth partially open until she tightened her lips as she made eye contact with someone off camera.

"They're upset," Prim said, her own voice shaking. "If the Capitol's upset, why'd they do it?"

Katniss didn't look her way. She suddenly felt too tired to stay awake, and she craved crawling into bed and lose consciousness for a few hours as an escape.

There was no answer to Prim's question anyway. At least not one that Katniss possessed.

"The Capitol isn't infallible," Mrs. Everdeen said softly.

Out of the corner of her eye, Katniss saw her mother reach out to comfort her youngest daughter. Prim collapsed into her mother's arms eagerly, nuzzling into her shoulder.

"Sometimes they misjudge. They might not have expected their own citizens to react to a child from a district."

XXX

The woods were a refuge the following day. Katniss had been careful to stay out of sight of the bakery's windows as she navigated her way the meadow to slip under the fence. She felt ashamed of the way she made her trip into a secret, but her moment with Peeta the day before wouldn't leave her mind—had been plaguing her even more than the toddler being reaped, if she was honest with herself—and she needed time away from him.

She wondered what he and the rest of his family were doing, one day later. They would have no way of knowing what Paan was up to, but he had to have reached the Capitol at the speeds the trains traveled by.

No matter what he had said about not feeling sorry to lose his brother, Katniss couldn't imagine that Peeta was going about his day unaffected.

While she had held hope of finding solitary refuge, she wasn't surprised when she detected signs that Gale was close by.

"Did you track me down like an animal?" she snapped at him when he came into view.

He held his hands up in surrender, but he didn't look sorry to have disturbed her.

Though she hadn't seen him since before the reaping, Katniss could detect no change in demeanor. Gale was the same as always. He had, like each year before, escaped having any of his family members shipped off to fight.

"It wasn't that difficult," he said, trying to grin even though there was caution to his movements. "We always follow the same route."

It was true, and Katniss wasn't sure why she hadn't broken from it to have more time alone. The possibility had never occurred to her as her feet had followed the same well-worn path. The familiarity was, after all, one of the things she found comforting.

She turned from Gale, busying herself with plucking the bird she'd shot down not long before her friend had appeared. Gale moved to sit beside her on the log, and Katniss didn't protest even as she refused to look at him.

"Have you talked to Peeta?" Gale asked.

Katniss hesitated.

"Yes," she said, voice cracking at the memory of it. "After he came back from the Justice Building."

Gale nodded and, surprising Katniss, didn't ask for more details of the exchange. He was fidgeting with his fingers in a way that was unlike him, and Katniss found it difficult to draw her eyes away from his hands.

"I've been thinking a lot since yesterday," Gale said, not looking in Katniss' direction. "When it was all over, I was just relieved. I knew I should feel sorry for Mellark, but all I cared about was that my family and yours were safe."

Katniss never would have blamed him for that. It was, after all, exactly how she had reacted at every single reaping she'd attended previously.

"I should have slept well last night, but I didn't. That was when it started to bother me."

Katniss frowned at him.

"What was bothering you?" she asked.

Whatever it was, it had made Gale uncomfortable with her. He didn't answer her question right away, continuing to fidget with his fingers.

"There are things I haven't told you," he said, "not because I haven't wanted to but because I didn't think you'd take too kindly to them. It was easier to keep them to myself, but at this point, I think you deserve to know. Besides, it didn't matter before, since you weren't interested in anyone at school. It feels different now, with Mellark. I feel like I need to say something."

Katniss' mind was in overdrive as she tried to keep up with what Gale was saying. She wasn't able to formulate a response during Gale's long pause before he was speaking again.

"I feel like an asshole for telling you the day after Mellark's brother was reaped, but at the same time, I don't know if I can keep it to myself anymore. Especially when I know Mellark could tell you the same sort of stuff at anytime before you'd heard me out first."

He looked at Katniss, and she shifted under the gaze. Her own eyes lowered to her lap, and though she wasn't sure what everything he had said meant, she felt heat in her cheeks as if, on some level, she understood what he was getting at.

"When I first met you," Gale continued, voice thick with emotion, "I didn't know what to think. You were mysterious. You would hardly talk to me, but when I got to know you, that changed. For years, you've helped me take care of my family, and that alone might have been enough to make me love you, but it's not just that.

"You're strong, Katniss. Stronger than most of the people in Twelve, and that's saying something with all the shit we're put through by the Capitol on a daily basis. There's something about you that's enthralling. Mellark sees it, and so do plenty of other people. I'm not an exception."

Katniss turned herself away from him, her whole body trembling in fear. Her ears rang, and her body was stiff as she fought the urge to run. Gale sensed her discomfort, and his words came faster, determined as he was to get them out before she ran away from him.

"I'm in love with you, Katniss. I have been for years, but it felt pointless to tell you because I never would have dreamed that you felt the same way. I still don't think you do, but I know it's only a matter of time before Mellark tells you the same thing. I want you to at least know how I feel in case, in some stroke of luck, it makes a difference in what you decide."

It was too much. Her thoughts turned to little more than noise, and she lost awareness of Gale beside her as she struggled to pull herself out of the chaos of her own thoughts.

She wasn't sure how long it took before she became aware of her breathing and how it slowed. Then she noticed Gale sitting beside her and watching her closely. He hadn't moved further or closer to her. Katniss watched him, almost as if he were a possible danger. She couldn't quite tell if she thought of him as one or not.

"Are you okay?" he asked her, fear in his voice.

Katniss nodded. She would be, at any rate, once she had managed to extricate herself from the situation.

"I don't know what to say. I wasn't expecting this."

Gale ran rubbed at his eyes.

"I figured," he muttered to himself before speaking louder. "You don't have to say anything, really, but I wanted you to know. Just in case…"

He trailed off, looking unsure of himself.

"Just in case," he concluded, not adding anything more.

It was awkward for several moments before Gale couldn't help himself and spoke again.

"I never expected you to be in love with me too. That's why I never said anything."

"For whatever it's worth," Katniss said, "I don't think I've ever 'liked' anyone in the way you're talking about. It's always been confusing, the way the girls at school talk about the people they like. I've never gotten excited about someone the way they do."

Gale looked uncomfortable, but he offered her a small grin.

"That's not the only way to like someone," he said. "It's just the way a lot of people do."

Katniss shrugged. She'd always known that to be true, but she wasn't sure she had ever romantically liked anyone in any other way either, unless she'd managed to have a crush without realizing it, which seemed impossible.

She'd rarely spared a second thought to romance as she'd had plenty of other things on her mind. When she had given herself a few moments to consider it, she'd never been certain if her lack of interest was because of her circumstances or because of her own innate characteristics. She wasn't sure when she'd be able to sort it out for herself, but she'd resigned herself to possibly never understanding. It wasn't often she thought about it anyway.


	18. Chapter 18

On the first day of the games, Peeta was silent as he walked alongside Katniss and Prim to the Seam. The games had already begun, though they hadn't watched the start live. None of them had a clue whether Paan had made it past the bloodbath alive.

He had received an average score in his presentation before the gamemakers the night before, and even that had surprised Katniss, who wasn't sure what skill he had that would benefit him in the arena.

Soon after they arrived home, the mandatory recaps would begin, and Peeta would have no choice but to face his brother's fate through the television screen. Katniss thought about him sitting in the bakery, watching everything unfold with his mother and father and Ry. It churned her stomach.

"Do you want to stay and watch with us?" she asked once they'd reached the Everdeen house and Peeta was preparing to turn back for the merchant quarter.

He'd been zoned out and distant for the entire walk, so it took a few seconds for him to realize Katniss had spoken to him. He blinked a few times before nodding, still looking like he was partially in a daze.

"If that's alright," he said in a murmur. "I could stay."

Katniss nodded. "Of course it's okay."

She offered Peeta the closest thing she could achieve to a smile, and he did his best to return it. He followed her inside, and Mrs. Everdeen and Prim gave him the same muted smiles that Katniss had, watching as he settled into one of the uncomfortable wooden chairs that sat around the kitchen table. He refused to look directly at any of them.

The television was already on, though the volume was low.

Katniss felt extremely unsure of herself. Over the time they'd been friends, Peeta had visited Prim when she wasn't feeling well a handful of times, but even during the most recent visits, Katniss hadn't stuck around.

She'd gotten used to Peeta around Twelve and Peeta in the woods, but it still felt odd to have him in her house. The woods felt like a more intimate place to her, but seeing Peeta with her family was strange in a way that seeing him anywhere else wasn't.

Settling into another chair beside Peeta, Katniss tried to focus on the television, where a purple-haired Caesar Flickerman was telling the country about what an exciting few hours they were up for.

Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Peeta tracing shapes against the top of the table. Katniss was tempted to watch him draw, to figure out what the shapes were, but she forced herself to look at the screen instead.

Prim chewed on the inside of her cheek, sitting cross-legged at the end of the bed, which placed her closest to the television set.

Mrs. Everdeen hovered around the kitchen, occasionally clanging things together. After a few minutes, she placed two cups of tea in front of Peeta and Katniss and passed another to Prim's waiting hands. It was brewed with herbs Katniss and Peeta had gathered in the forest and was nothing like the black tea that could be found in the store in town.

Her eyes flickered back to the screen as they showed a recap of the previous interviews. Katniss didn't need to see them again.

Paan hadn't been interested in providing detailed answers to any of Flickerman's questions. When asked about his family, he'd mentioned having two brothers but had said nothing more. He'd said even less about his parents. There were no reassuring words like many of the other tributes offered to the camera in place of their families.

For Paan, there had been no tears, just a frozen stoic expression.

On the screen, the cornucopia of the arena was revealed, with each of the tributes rising from the ground around it. It was their first glimpse of the place where all but one of them would die.

The camera provided the audience with a bird's eye view that allowed them to see the circular arena. The tributes stood on platforms surrounded by water. In the middle of them was a small island that held the cornucopia. Surrounding them was a beach that turned into forest entirely unlike the one Katniss was familiar with outside Twelve.

Peeta swore under his breath, startling Katniss and forcing her to face him.

Though his eyes remained on the TV, he sensed Katniss' gaze.

"Paan can't swim," he said, voice carefully controlled. "The most water he's been in at once was the bathtub."

"I doubt he's the only one," Katniss said. "If any of the tributes but those from Four know how to swim, I'll be surprised."

As it turned out, the Career districts must have made swimming part of their regimens because many of the Careers jumped right off their platforms when the cannon sounded and swam for the cornucopia. The other tributes watched them go in various states of shock and horror.

Katniss watched with bated breath as the Capitol cameras flickered between the tributes, showing some who felt brave enough to dip their toes in the water. Then they were back on the Careers, showing them ransacking the cornucopia for whichever weapons they wanted.

Despite the strangeness of this particular game, the Career alliance seemed to have been struck the same as always. The tribute from Two held open a sack and allowed the tribute from Four to empty an armful of supplies into it, not caring about what he'd managed to grab.

The camera showed Paan. He'd lowered himself to sit on his platform with his feet dangling in the water. His head was turning from side-to-side without rest, watching for any potential threats. His eyes would sometimes flicker down to the water, scared of something coming up and latching onto one of his legs.

Though he wasn't moving, he was breathing heavily enough that his chest rising and falling was visible on screen. The gears in his mind must have been moving as he struggled to come up with a plan when, suddenly, he plunged into the water.

Peeta was on his feet in a split second, turning his back on the television and startling the Everdeens. Katniss thought at first that another tribute must have pulled Paan into the water, and she was certain he was dead. But as she watched, she realized he had made the decision for himself.

He struggled to tread water, and Katniss was impressed at how well he managed it despite not having done so before. It wasn't graceful, but he was mostly able to keep his head above water as long as he devoted all of his energy to the task, but he couldn't figure out how to navigate and began moving with the waves, back and forth.

No one in the house said a word as it played out. The Capitol didn't spend much time on Paan, but the cameras kept coming back to him, with the announcers speculating about how well he'd fare. Eventually, he would tire of supporting himself and then, at last, he would die.

They hadn't accounted for the—perhaps stupid, if the announcers were to be believed—actions of one of the other tributes: the young man from District 11. Somehow, he'd been able to make it to the cornucopia—though Katniss didn't understand how he had learned to swim—and he reached over the edge, pulling Paan onto one of the long arms that snaked out from the cornucopia's center.

"Do you have a death wish?" the teenager shouted at Paan.

Paan stared at him as he panted like a man who had just fought for his life.

Peeta had turned back around to watch the scene, gawking as his brother faced the boy.

When Paan didn't answer right away, the boy took it upon himself to speak.

"You're Paan Mellark, right? From Twelve?"

Paan nodded. He hadn't yet regained enough breath to speak.

"I'm Horace Pauling."

"I remember," Paan coughed out. "You couldn't tie knots."

Horace laughed as if Paan had been making a purposeful joke. He bobbed his head in a nod.

"I can't," he admitted. "I'll just have to make due without them. You can't swim."

"I can't," Paan confirmed, his breathing gradually slowing. "It'll be harder to do without it."

Horace looked out over the water as Paan stood.

"It will be," Horace admitted.

Both men turned to look at the center of the arena, where the Career pack, if they could even be called that, was occupied with fighting off their challengers. Neither of the men made a move in that direction.

"Want to be partners?" Horace asked abruptly.

Paan's eyes widened, though Kantiss wasn't sure what he'd expected to happen after Horace had pulled him out of the water and not immediately tried to kill him.

"Should you pair up with a guy who can't swim in an arena like this?"

Horace shrugged, his eyes gazing around them instead of at Paan as he spoke.

"I don't know if teaming up with anyone is smart," he admitted. "It seems stupid to give someone the opportunity to stab you in the back, but I'd like to keep some hold on my humanity in this place, and maybe helping your sorry ass try to swim will do the trick."

Paan had gone from looking surprised to looking angry and defensive. He opened his mouth, but before he could say anything, Horace held up a hand to silence him.

"We don't have time," he said. "Soon, the Careers will have finished everyone off over there, and we need to be away from the cornucopia before then."

"We don't have any weapons."

Horace looked at him as if he'd lost his mind.

"I'm not getting in that mess," he said, motioning at the cornucopia over his shoulder. "We can worry about weapons later. Right now, I want what shelter we can get. We need to get to that beach or, better yet, the trees. They have trees in Twelve, right? You'll be of more use there?"

"There are trees around Twelve, but I've never been in them."

The full meaning of Horace's words hit Paan.

"How do you plan to get us both to the beach?" he asked. "I can't swim, and that's a lot farther than the platforms."

Horace looked him over, sizing him up.

"We'll make it," he said, sounding more confident than the specifics of the situation should have warranted. "We won't die today, Paan. Leave it to me.""

Paan didn't look convinced, and when Katniss glanced at Peeta, he didn't either.

The last they saw of Horace and Paan, the pair had miraculously made it across the water and were trekking through the woods as they became more desperate for water they couldn't find.


	19. Chapter 19

"I think something big is coming."

Gale's voice was a whisper, one that didn't carry enough for Mrs. Everdeen and Prim to discern it from where they were watching the TV from across the room.

"Something big?" Katniss repeated.

She felt her voice had been too loud, but glancing at her family, she saw that neither of them had looked in their direction. If they were listening, they were doing a remarkable job of pretending they weren't.

"Like what?" she asked. "The grand finale of the games?"

"The rumors in the mines have gotten worse. Everyone's talking about them now that the games have started. These days, you'd be hard pressed to find a miner who isn't convinced something's happening in the other districts, something we're not being told."

"What's got that in their heads?" Katniss asked. "If it's a secret, no one here is going to know about it."

Gale shifted uncomfortably.

"That's not true," he pointed out. "I know it feels isolating here in the mountains, but we're connected to the rest of Panem. Cray probably talks to Snow every day, or at least one of Snow's underlings. The peacekeepers know more than the rest of us, and there's enough of them that they're never going to stay completely silent."

"You're saying the peacekeepers are telling people things?"

"That's what people are saying."

Katniss took a long inhale through her nose before answering.

"If they're just saying it, then it's probably not true. How do you know this isn't just people in the mines making up lies for a laugh?"

"Making up lies that could get them killed if Cray got wind of them? No one's stupid enough to try pulling that trick."

"All right then," Katniss conceded. "Who's to say it's not a joke a peacekeeper is playing? Maybe they're planning to catch you out for it. That's the last thing anyone needs."

"I don't think so," Gale said, though there was a note of hesitance in his voice. "I think the peacekeepers really did let something out, and I don't think they were lying. Besides, it's not just the peacekeepers."

"Then who else?" she asked.

"Haymitch."

Katniss stiffened.

"If Haymitch thinks something up, he probably got it put into his head by some Capitol airhead who thought it would be hilarious to mess with the drunk. No one's passing him important information."

"Not Capitol people, but he does know the other victors, right? They have to talk."

She didn't respond.

"You don't have to take it as fact," Gale added, leaning closer. "Just consider it. Something big might be coming, and I think it's likely to happen sooner rather than later. I don't trust that these games are going to end the same way as all the others."

XXX

Peeta's eyes widened when Katniss stepped into the bakery. He'd been hunched over the front counter, his head resting against his open palm, but he shot up once his brain had taken the few seconds necessary to ascertain that it was Katniss standing inside his family's business.

She glanced around, self-conscious. She hadn't spent much time in the building before, and she found it stifling. It was a little too warm when she'd just come out of the summer sun, and she could sense the tension the place had absorbed over the years.

Peeta was only looking at her, his mouth slightly open, so Katniss took it upon herself to speak first.

"You haven't been into the woods in a week. I think it would do you some good."

If she'd been in his position, she imagined she'd have been unable to leave the woods. Perhaps she would have stayed there until the peacekeepers declared enough was enough and dragged her out to finally punish her for her crimes.

"Dad needs me," Peeta said, his voice cracking as if he hadn't used it much over the preceding days. "I can't just up and leave."

Mr. Mellark appeared in the doorway that led to the kitchen as if he'd been listening since Katniss walked through the door.

"I can manage," he said. "It's not as if we've been busy the past several days."

Katniss didn't notice at first that the man's eyes were red-rimmed, but once she had, it left her feeling even more uncomfortable. She kept her eyes locked on the large window that occupied the front wall, watching a few people move around in the middle of the town square.

"Mom would kill you if she found out," Peeta said

Mr. Mellark cringed but didn't contradict his youngest son.

"She'll never know," he said instead. "You'll be back before she bothers to come downstairs. If I'm wrong, I'll bear the brunt of it."

When Peeta still hesitated, Mr. Mellark stepped forward to physically shoo Peeta out from behind the counter.

"Go," he urged, his voice sharper than Katniss had heard it before.

The intensity of that one word was enough to startle Peeta. His eyes grew wide as he looked at his father, and after a moment's pause, he nodded.

"Okay," he said, watching his father oddly as he moved toward Katniss.

He tugged off the flour coated apron he wore and tossed it over a small rack directly behind the counter. He didn't turn back to look at his father, who remained in the doorway watching them with sadness in his eyes.

Katniss offered Mr. Mellark a small nod as Peeta brushed past her and out the door. The man tried to smile back, but it didn't reach his eyes. He had disappeared into the back before Katniss was out the door herself.

XXX

It was the first time Katniss had followed Peeta into the woods instead of the other way around. His pace was quick, and after they'd cleared the fence, Katniss realized there was a grace to his movements that hadn't been there during his first excursions outside the district. He was comfortable among the trees.

They came across a patch of small white daisies, and Peeta pulled up short, crouching down to get a better look at them.

While daisies were one of the plants they would often collect for food, Peeta didn't make a move to pick any of them, and Katniss followed his lead as she crouched beside him, watching him run a gentle finger over the petals.

"It's a shame they can be food," Peeta eventually said.

His voice was low, and it cracked when he used it.

"Why's that?"

"They're beautiful, but we end up destroying them for food."

"They're everywhere," Katniss pointed out. "Some people call them weeds. Whatever we pick, more always grow back."

"But each of them are pretty," he continued. "And I don't care what people say about them being weeds, they're pretty flowers."

He turned to look at Katniss full on for the first time that day, and Katniss was unable to find a response. They looked at each other for what felt like ages before Peeta turned back to the flowers and spoke again.

"I'm not saying we shouldn't eat them. Of course I'm not. I'm just saying it's a shame that the stuff we need to eat is pretty."

"Would you rather eat something that looks like garbage?" Katniss asked, nose wrinkling at the thought.

Peeta let out a short exhale that might have been something like a laugh. Katniss noticed his shoulders shake as if he were holding it in.

"No, I wouldn't," he admitted. "I'd like my food to look like it didn't come out of a trash can."

"You could always try to survive on tessa rae bread alone," Katniss said. "No one's complimenting it for its beauty."

"Tessa rae bread, lettuce," he listed off, grinning as he counted on his fingers, "and maybe some cheese. I might be able to make it work."

"No meat?"

Peeta shrugged, his grin disappearing.

"I guess I can't say animals are ugly," he said.

Katniss couldn't help but smirk.

"Buttercup is as ugly as they come. You can eat him if you like."

She was surprised when Peeta shared in her grin, though he shook his head moments later.

"Buttercup's beauty aside, I'd never be able to face Prim again, so I'll have to pass on the offer."

"Your loss," Katniss said. "It won't be my problem when you're low on protein."

Peeta gave a second of thought.

"I suppose beans aren't particularly pretty," he said.

"Good luck," Katniss said, doing her best to keep a straight face.

It didn't last long. The two of them began nodding, looking at each other. Peeta broke into laughter before her, but she didn't last much longer. They both collapsed against the forest floor, clutching their stomachs.


	20. Chapter 20

Chapter 20

Each day Paan remained alive, Peeta felt a heavier weight on his shoulders. It was always at its worst at the end of the day, once the bakery had been locked and he was huddled around the TV with his parents and Ry.

He had managed to forget about Shaniya's existence. Though Paan had been dating her for five years, Peeta had only spoken to her at length several times, and none of those conversations had been memorable. He'd often thought Paan purposefully kept her away from the family, which Peeta couldn't blame him for.

She'd been fine with staying away at first, not making any appearances at the bakery as the games progressed, but once the arena was down to five tributes, with Paan miraculously being one of them, she'd appeared just before mandatory viewing and asked to watch with them.

For some inexplicable reason, Peeta's mother had allowed it, and Peeta found himself watching the two women more than the TV as the game highlights began.

As the clock ticked on, both on the wall of their home and in the arena the Capitol had constructed, Peeta found himself thinking of the five-year-old who had once taken a crying Peeta in his arms and locked them in the bathroom from the inside, not the young adult who was fighting for his life in the arena or who had come close to marrying the stranger sitting in their house.

Watching Paan on screen should have felt horrific, should have left him in tears like the ones streaming down Shaniya's face, but it didn't. He felt empty.

He'd mourned the loss of his brother long before Paan stepped into that arena.

Sudden movement from Ry drew Peeta's attention away from Shaniya's sobbing. The two boys made eye contact for several seconds before Ry looked away.

Perhaps he should have taken everything with Paan as an opportunity to reconnect with the brother he still had. Ry had once taken his role as an older brother very seriously. He had protected Peeta for a lot longer than Paan had, but even he had given up in time, and Peeta felt just as distant from him as he had Paan.

A sob that was far closer to a scream echoed through the room, ripping Peeta from his thoughts.

On the television screen, Paan was lying on the ground, a spear sticking out of his abdomen. Shaniya's scream shifted into sobs again.

Peeta hadn't even been looking when his brother was killed.

The family watched with wide eyes as Paan struggled to breathe. Another tribute stood over him, taunting him. It was one of the adults with salt and pepper hair. The woman stepped on a few of his fingers as she relished being one step closer to victory.

Paan tried to cry out, but he couldn't get the oxygen needed for it. Finally, his face full of pain, he grew still, and the cannon echoed through the air.

Peeta could do nothing but stare at the screen and listen to Shaniya's whimpering.

From the corner of his eye, Peeta saw his father stand up. He turned to look at the man in time to see him disappear into the hallway. Peeta turned to his mother, curious as to what she felt after seeing the boy she had harassed die in such a way, but her face was blank as she stared at the screen.

He made eye contact with his remaining brother once more, and Ry offered him a strange nod that Peeta wasn't sure how to interpret. Nevertheless, he nodded back.

XXX

It was the middle of summer, but Katniss was shivering when she reached the bakery. She rubbed her hands up and down her arms as she looked through the large glass window. The lights were off downstairs, so there wasn't anything to see. But upstairs, several windows were lit. She knew they had to be awake. It was only a short while since they'd been allowed to switch off their television set.

Taking a deep breath, Katniss raised her hand and rapped against the bakery door, hopingーyet scaredーthat the noise would carry upstairs.

It took a long time for there to be any detectable movement inside the bakery. Katniss, already wavering when she'd knocked, was seconds away from leaving when she noticed a figure emerge from the back room.

Her heart stuttered when she saw that it was Peeta.

He paused when he realized who had showed up at their door. Through the darkness, it was hard for Katniss to see much of anything on his face.

He tugged the door open.

"Hi," he said, his voice hesitant in a way Katniss hated.

"Hi," she echoed, looking down at her shoes as she debated what to do.

When her father had died, she'd been the one to comfort Prim in the aftermath, but Prim had sobbed uncontrollably for days. That wasn't what Peeta was doing, and if he had been, she couldn't have held him close like she had Prim.

The silence stretched on between them, with neither making the move to break it.

After a long pause, Peeta stepped forward, startling Katniss and making her move back from the door. He joined her on the porch and tugged the door closed behind him.

He didn't say anything as he lowered himself onto the top step and stared out at what they could see of town. Katniss followed his lead as she took the space beside him.

She kept glancing at him, wanting to determine how he felt but also not wanting to accidentally make eye contact and feel as if she had to say something.

"Nice night," he said out of nowhere, startling her.

She hesitated before replying.

"Yeah, it is."

She didn't bother to look away from him anymore. He was so intent on looking at the street that he didn't notice the attention.

"It's weird how we can say that," he continued, "even as people die. How many people in Twelve are starving, yet they'll say it too. 'We may be hungry, but at least the weather's nice.'"

Katniss' silence made him finally look at her. She stiffened and watched the shift in his demeanor once his eyes were on her. He sighed and closed his eyes for a few seconds before opening them and failing to produce a small smile.

"It is a nice night though," he said. "Weather wise. Even in the arena, did you notice? I guess it beats dying in a downpour."

Katniss didn't think Paan had noticed the stars in his final minutes with a spear through his abdomen, but she nodded.

"I'd like to die indoors," Peeta continued. "Preferably in bed. In my sleep would be nice."

"Here's hoping then."

Somehow, her comment led to the genuine smile Peeta had failed at moments before.

"Paan's girlfriend was in the bakery," he admitted, his tone returning to something close to normal. "She wanted to watch with us and screamed when it happened. The rest of us just watched."

"I didn't know Paan had a girlfriend," was what Katniss chose to comment on. "Did he mention her in his interview?"

"He didn't talk about Twelve at all. It was about how he'd prepared and useless shit like that."

Katniss nodded, remembering the way Paan had deftly avoided answering questions about his family but had went on at length about learning to use a dagger.

He'd managed to get ahold of one late in his second day in the arena.

"She's still up there," Peeta continued, craning his neck to get a look at one of the lit windows on the upper floor. "I can't believe Mom hasn't kicked her out. Actually, I can't believe she hasn't left on her own."

"Give her time," Katniss said. "She has to leave eventually."

Peeta shrugged as if he didn't care what she did, but the way his eyes flickered back to the window gave away the truth.

Katniss followed his gaze, but they couldn't see anything but the curtains.

"Can I tell you something?"

The hesitant question made Katniss' stomach ice over, but she nodded.

"I know we never talk about my mom," he began, watching Katniss to judge her reaction. "But, uh, things used to be really bad with her. It's better now than it was when I was little. When I was a toddler, I was terrified of her, but it wasn't until I was six that she hit me. That wasn't from a lack of trying on her part. For years, any time she got close to me, Paan or Ry would be there. They'd jump in front of me and take the blow instead.

"It didn't stay like that forever. One time, when I was eight, Mom started yelling at Paan about something, I've never been able to remember what. Paan yelled back, which wasn't unusual. He was the only one of us who did that, and that meant he got it worse than me or Ry. She threw a bowl at him, and it hit him in the side of the head. Then she lunged for him. I was standing nearby, cowering in the corner. Paan grabbed me and held me between him and Mom like a shield."

Peeta kept his eyes averted from Katniss as she gasped, and a strange urge washed over her, making her scoot closer to assure Peeta that she was there. Peeta stiffened before he relaxed into the closeness. He tilted his face upwards and attempted to smile. Katniss didn't smile back.

"It got worse after that," he concluded. "Paan never protected me anymore, not that I can blame him for not wanting to get hit. It's not like I did either."

"Trying to avoid your mom is a lot different from throwing your brother at her," Katniss pointed out.

"I envy you," Peeta said abruptly.

Katniss raised an eyebrow.

"Why?" she asked.

Peeta let out a short laugh.

"Only you could listen to what I just told you about my family and wonder that."

"My family isn't that great," Katniss said before she could feel the beginnings of guilt. She continued, "Except Prim. Prim's wonderful, but other than that… My mom nearly let us starve to death."

"I'd still rather have your mom than mine," Peeta said. "By a long shot."

Katniss wanted to argue, but she couldn't find it inside herself to do so. Not quite sure what had come over her, Katniss reached out a hesitant hand, holding it palm up towards Peeta. He looked at her, surprised, before reaching out and grasping her hand.

They let their hands hang between them for a while, Katniss listening to Peeta's shaky breathing as he struggled to process the events of the past week. Neither of them said another word.

 **A/N: This was the last chapter to show any of the Quarter Quell as it's happening. The consequences of it, though, will continue.**


	21. Chapter 21

"I'm telling you, something is off."

Katniss fiddled with the sleeve of her jacket as she followed Gale through the forest. Ostensibly, they were hunting, but Gale had been more interested in discussing the conclusion of the Quarter Quell since they'd met on the other side of the fence.

The victor, a middle-aged woman from Two, had been crowned late the night before, and though much of Panem was buzzing about it, Katniss was sure most of that buzz had nothing to do with why it was Gale's preferred topic of conversation.

"Something is always off with the Capitol," Katniss said, tired of listening to Gale go on when she would much rather have silence and the ability to actually find some game. "Nothing they do is for the reasons they say it is."

"Yeah, but this time it's not the Capitol doing it," Gale continued. "There's something else up. Something with the victors. I'm telling you, they know something. Even Haymitch. I'm sure of it."

"What does it matter?" Katniss asked. "It doesn't concern us. Whatever's happening in the Capitol, life will be the same regardless. I don't know what anyone in the Capitol or the other districts are up to, and I don't care. What I care about is making sure my little sister has food tonight, and so far we're doing a terrible job of that."

Gale stopped walking and turned to face her, a frown creasing his forehead.

"We haven't checked the traps," he pointed out, "and we have plenty of time before sunset. Katniss, are you really that worried about not having food, or does the idea of something actually changing scare you?"

Katniss felt acid creeping up her throat. She tightened her hands into fists, trying to release some of the tension.

"I want things to change as much as the next person," she said. "Believe me. The problem is, I don't think that's going to happen, and I'd rather survive in reality than die in a fantasy that the world is going to change for good."

"We're not dying," Gale scoffed. "Not by a long shot. Sure, it's hard, but we're better off than a lot of others in the Seam. This, though, it could change things for everyone."

"I don't know what you expect to happen," Katniss said before he could continue. "The Capitol may fawn over their precious victors, but they'd never betray Snow for any of them. If the victors are up to anything, it's probably for themselves. Maybe Haymitch wants a steady supply of the Capitol's finest liquor so he can stop drowning himself in moonshine from the Hob."

Gale snorted, leaning against a tree.

"I may not think the best of Haymitch, but even I have more faith in him than that. Besides, our moonshine is at least as good as anything the Capitol's got."

Katniss, who had never tasted either product, didn't provide Gale with a response. With a slight shake of her head, she brushed past him, determined to find something she could take home to prove to herself that the day hadn't been a bust.

But Gale wasn't finished.

"Just imagine what could happen if we actually stood up to the Capitol for once. We wouldn't have to put children up for slaughter every year. Prim could get better treatment from a doctor. Imagine that, Katniss."

"No," Katniss growled, not slowing her walk and not looking back at him. "I'm not letting you fill my head with some fantasy that'll never be real."

"It's not a fantasy," Gale said. "Everyone in the mines sees it coming. All of us. We can't all be losing touch with reality. Something is coming. Not just in Twelve but in Panem. Something long overdue."

"Say it is," Katniss shot back. "What does that mean for us? Another war? Another hopeless rebellion the Capitol can crush? What will they subject us to then? If their Hunger Games fail, what's their next line of defense? Mass slaughter, since killing only some of us didn't work? What happens to our families? What happens to Prim, to Rory, to Vick, to Posey?"

Gale clenched his jaw.

"They have better futures," he replied.

Katniss scoffed, and Gale continued in a louder voice.

"I don't know what you think after all the years we've known each other, Katniss, but I'm not an idiot. I know a rebellion means taking a risk. The Capitol's already proven they're not above killing the kids, but that's why we have to rebel. Don't you see? My name won't be in the reaping anymore. I can't volunteer for Vick or Rory. I never could have for Posey. But their names are still in there, and Prim's will be too when yours isn't. Maybe a rebellion puts them in danger, but living underneath the Capitol has already done that. Only one option includes the chance that one day they'll be safe, and I don't think it's wrong to want to take it."

"It's not," Katniss admitted.

Her throat felt tight, making it hard to speak, but she forced herself to power through it and continue.

"I get it. I get wanting a world where everyone is safe, but I can't hope for something that places Prim in danger. Especially when long term safety isn't a guarantee. Or likely. The Capitol crushed the last rebellion. We're worse off now than we were then. I don't see what could be different this time."

"Maybe that's exactly what _is_ different," Gale said.

Katniss raised an eyebrow at him.

"We're worse off," he continued. "At this point, what do we have to lose? If you're willing to do anything to win, then you're already a step ahead of the other side. The Capitol has a force of highly trained peacekeepers, but do any of them want to die for a Capitol that oppresses them too? No, I guarantee they don't, and that's the difference."

"What weapons do you plan to fight with? Pickaxes? Against the peacekeepers' guns and hovercrafts and bombs?"

Gale's frown turned into a smirk.

"You have to give us more credit than that."

For the first time, Katniss realized the miners had gotten far enough into their delusions to be discussing what weapons to use. Though it was a hot summer's day, her blood felt like ice in her veins, and a shiver traveled down her spine.

A touch to her shoulder startled her, and she surfaced from her thoughts enough to ascertain that Gale was next to her, gripping her shoulder to get her attention. She moved away from him, and he didn't try to follow her.

"Leave me alone," she said. "I need to think. I can't think."

Gale held his hands up in surrender, eyes wide with something akin to fear. He watched as Katniss backed away from him.

She turned from him and pushed herself farther into the woods, not sure where she was heading.

XXX

Katniss began to see things she hadn't previously.

There were whispers, and they weren't the usual whispers that one expected around the Hob about illegal game or some trinket said to have come to Twelve from the Capitol years previously.

The peacekeepers were no longer visiting the illicit marketplace. They prowled Twelve with stiff shoulders, eyes narrowed as they watched people go about their daily business. It was a far cry from the bored looks Katniss was used to seeing one their faces.

Haymitch returned to the district after the games, and it caused a larger stir than usual, particularly among the younger miners. They hid their curiosity in the man from the peacekeepers, but Katniss saw some of them approach the drunk in the Hob, with Haymitch shooing them away with an irritated wave of his hand as he bought his alcohol.

Perhaps she should have found it reassuring that he hadn't wanted to speak to them. She might have for a day or two, but then Romulus Thread appeared.

One day, Cray was in charge of the district, leading peacekeepers that looked increasingly angry, yes, but not doing much that was outside the norm. The next, everything had changed.

Katniss had been avoiding the woods that day, knowing Gale would be in them on his one day of the week off. She'd instead made plans with Peeta to spend time together inside the district.

She had never in her wildest dreams expected to encounter someone being whipped in the middle of the square, strung up on a post that had been erected sometime in the past day.

There was a crowd of people that Katniss could see through, and at first, she couldn't be sure of what was happening. But there were definite sounds of a whip and someone's cries. A feeling of dread made her stomach feel like a lead weight as she inched forward.

Peeta caught sight of her long before she saw him. He approached her, his own face set in a frown.

"What's going on?" she asked when she spotted him.

"There's a new head peacekeeper," Peeta whispered as if he didn't want the people around them to hear.

Some of them were looking at Katniss in a way that made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up.

"He caught Gale trying to sell a turkey, and—"

Knowing who was being whipped, Katniss didn't stay to listen to the rest of Peeta's explanation. He didn't try to stop her, though he followed as she pushed through the easily parted crowd.

When she made it to the clearing in the middle, she froze, taking in the sight of Gale hunched over in pain yet held up by chains wrapped around his wrists. His back was covered in cuts that were oozing blood. A man she'd never seen before stood over him, face furious as he gripped a whip in his hands.

Around them, on the other side of the circle, stood peacekeepers who were familiar to Katniss. Many of them had purchased goods from her and Gale before. She wondered if one of them had been the one to turn Gale in. She wondered if she would be next.

Somehow, that didn't stop her.

The man raised the whip once more, and, unthinkingly, Katniss rushed forward, launching herself into the space between Gale and the man. The whip came down on her face with a crack.

It was more painful than she had expected in the split second before it made contact. Tears sprang to her eyes, and she was sure, without being able to see it, that a welt was already forming. She couldn't open the eye that had been hit, and she had the fleeting thought that she might have been permanently blinded in that eye.

There were more pressing matters than that, though, and the thought was quickly drowned out by the danger she found herself in.

The unfamiliar peacekeeper's face was full of rage at having been intercepted. Though he didn't raise the whip again, he kept his grip on it tight, no doubt intending to use it once more after he'd sorted out the problem at hand.

"Who are you?" he snapped at Katniss, looking her up and down in a way that made bile rise in her throat.

"Katniss Everdeen."

She was surprised at how strong her voice sounded. She certainly didn't feel brave as her heart pounded in her chest.

The man laughed. He took a step back, lowering his hand that held the whip to his side. Behind Katniss, Gale moaned, but he didn't have the energy to speak, and her attention was too focused on the man in front of her to try to discern what Gale was telling her.

"I need you to step out of the way, miss," the peacekeeper said, his voice shallowly polite even as malice glinted in his eyes. "You're interrupting the rightful punishment of a criminal."

"Since when are people whipped in the street?"

Before the man could answer, Peeta was at her side. Katniss felt a rush of frustration. She hadn't intended for him to get involved, and she was tempted to snap at him in front of the peacekeeper, but he spoke before she could, his hands raised in the hope of placating the soldier.

"We're very sorry," Peeta said in a calmer voice than the professional peacekeeper had been able to manage. "We really are. It's just that this man is a friend of ours, and we'd like to know what it is he's done to deserve something like this. If he's broken the law, why not handle it privately? You're scaring the children."

The man's gaze followed Peeta's pointing finger to several children who were huddled together on the edge of the crowd, staring at the proceedings with wide, frightened eyes as they held each other.

The scene caused the man to smirk rather than appear regretful as Peeta might have hoped. It also called his attention to how large the crowd around them had become. His posture straightened as his eyes roved the crowd.

"Now, why would I do that?" the man asked, turning back to Peeta, Katniss, and Gale with his cruel smile firmly in place. "It's clear to me that District 12 has been allowed to run wild. Thankfully, President Snow was smart enough to send me here to fix that. Gone are the days when you lot could get away with breaking the law as you've been allowed to do for so long."

He turned to look at the assembled crowd, making it clear his words were for everyone. The people of Twelve frowned back. Many of the older people in the crowd looked grim, but some of the children were more confused than anything else. A young boy of around six, with a firm grip on the pants leg of his father, tugged to get the man's attention, asking a question that couldn't be heard from the middle of the circle but which caused the father to hush the boy.

Katniss turned back to the peacekeeper, brow furrowed. What had happened to Cray? Just the day before, Katniss had seen him in the Hob purchasing soup from Greasy Sae and looking confident of his position. There was no reason he shouldn't have been. He'd been the head peacekeeper in Twelve her entire life.

The man smirked at Katniss' confusion.

"I'm Romulus Thread," he said in a booming voice that carried over the assembled people though his eyes remained on Katniss. "Snow has appointed me as the head peacekeeper of Twelve, a title I intend to return the honor to. Your friend," he said the word with distaste, "was selling an illegal turkey. One that he no doubt went into the woods to fetch, as I have been reliably informed the birds do not regularly fly over the district fence as your friend attempted to claim they do."

It could have been possible for Gale to get the bird that way. Katniss had seen turkeys fly high enough during an escape that they could have made it over the fence if they'd tried, but it was also true that she had never seen such a thing actually happen. They didn't tend to come near town.

Thread continued, "I am executing a punishment that is on the books and entirely legal. If you would like to discuss it further, that can be done at a later time. After Hawthorne's lashes have been administered."

Fire burned in Katniss' veins. She felt Peeta touch her elbow, but it didn't shift her focus away from Thread, who held her attention in a strangely hypnotic, though terrifying, way. He was unlike any peacekeeper she'd previously encountered. She was used to them being cruel if they didn't get their way but entirely uninterested in following the letter of the law.

She took a step forward, unsure what she was about to say but knowing it would get her into a heap of trouble she didn't need.

As she opened her mouth, a figure staggered out of the crowd, managing to catch everyone's attention as he nearly stumbled to the ground.

"Woah, woah, woah."

Katniss' eyes widened as she watched Haymitch Abernathy place himself strategically between her and Thread. He held his hands up as if he were protesting his own innocence.

"Let's not do anything too hasty," Haymitch told Thread, his voice almost mocking. "The girl hasn't broken any laws. You can't blame her for being a little shocked to see her friend hunched over with welts all over his back. That gets people a little worked up."

He faux whispered the last part as if he and Thread were conspirators concealing their true feelings from Katniss. As if they were both somehow above ridiculous emotions that "normal" people felt when they saw someone beaten.

Katniss supposed they both were. That was the only way one rose to either of their positions.

She leaned around Haymitch to look at Thread. She took in his armor, a more intense version than anything the peacekeepers wore in Twelve. It looked similar to the pictures she'd seen of peacekeepers during the rebellion except modernized.

Gale's words flashed through her mind.

But perhaps Thread just relished the chance to feel powerful and chose his armor for personal reasons. Perhaps this was the standard uniform wherever he'd last been stationed. Not everyone did things like they did in Twelve. Thread had already reminded her of that much.

"That may be," Thread continued, speaking to Haymitch as one might a toddler who needed things simplified, "but she is also interfering in a lawful punishment. That in and of itself warrants action on my part."

"Does it?"

Haymitch's pointed question drew a mixture of groans and gasps from the crowd, especially the older members.

"You've made an example of the boy," Haymitch said. "Everyone," he motioned at the crowd, "knows what will happen to them if they defy the Capitol. The girl is young. As you rightfully pointed out, Cray had let obedience slip here. The girl was shocked, but she's been reminded of her place. She won't bother you again, just as I'm sure the boy won't either once you let him go."

Haymitch paused, but Thread didn't give him a response. Katniss had become more enthralled with the back of Haymitch's head than the peacekeeper. Though there was an occasional slur to Haymitch's words, she'd never seen him so lucid.

"Look at him," he said, motioning behind Katniss.

Thread's eyes narrowed in suspicion. He knew what Haymitch was doing, but the small glances he sent the crowd hinted that he didn't want to call the victor out on it when they had an audience.

Haymitch continued, "He's passed out. You're not really teaching him a lesson if he's not conscious for it, are you?"

Thread let out a huff. With a dismissive wave of his hand, he turned from them.

"Take the young man," he said with the confidence of one who was getting their intended outcome. "He's faced his consequences."

His eyes scanned the crowd, causing some to flinch or move to escape.

"Tell everyone you know that Romulus Thread is \ in charge here, and all laws will be followed. No exceptions."

The last part was practically barked, and one small child broke into tears, his father squatting quickly as he tried to hush the child. Thread ignored them, turning back to Katniss with a look of disgust. He didn't say anything, but his overt hostility was enough of a warning. He stalked off, and Katniss felt the pressure in her chest ease.

"That was idiotic," Haymitch growled as soon as Thread was out of sight.

Katniss bristled.

"I never asked for your help," she shot back.

Haymitch snorted. Katniss couldn't tell if he was amused or pissed off. She couldn't find it in herself to care either way.

"No," he agreed, "but it wouldn't have done anyone any good to watch you get the same as him, would it?"

He motioned at Gale, who was hunched over on the ground, his arms bent awkwardly due to the ropes binding him to the post. Katniss rushed over, tugging at them. They were tight, as evidenced by the blood that had stained them. Katniss bit at the inside of her cheek.

She couldn't look at the marks that littered his back.

One of the men Gale worked with stepped forward with a pocket knife in his hand, and Katniss moved far enough away for him to cut Gale free, Peeta and another miner catching Gale's lifeless body before he fell to the ground.

"We should take him to Mrs. Everdeen," Haymitch said, and Katniss was surprised when all the men except Peeta nodded.

Her forehead creased, but there was too much happening for her to ask about the choice. Several more men came forward, carrying a door between them. Katniss had no idea where they'd gotten it, but she couldn't complain as they lifted Gale onto it, a group of them that included Peeta lifting Gale and hurrying towards the Seam as fast as they could.

"We always used to take them to your mother," Haymitch explained for her benefit as he followed the group with Katniss. "Before Cray," he continued at Katniss' confused look. "The last peacekeeper was like the Thread fellow. We took everyone he punished to your mother. She's the best healer in the district."

She knew about her mother's talent for healing, but she'd never suspected that she'd honed that talent out of a need to heal people from injuries like those Gale was suffering from. There had been enough suffering in Twelve throughout Katniss' lifetime. It was hard to imagine it being worse, and she'd never been told anything about a head peacekeeper before Cray.

She felt useless as the men carried Gale through the streets. She fidgeted with her hands, wanting to do something with them. Instead, she had her thoughts and a victor who was staying inexplicably by her side.

"Why did you do it?" she asked. "Why step in for Gale?"

Haymitch gave her a smile that felt crueler than it did comforting.

"I may be a murderer, but even I have my limits when it comes to cruelty."

At first, she thought that was the only answer she'd get from him, but he continued a few seconds later.

"Besides, I like that boy. He's a fighter, more so than a lot of others in this damn place. Whatever Thread hoped to achieve, I think he's made a fighter stronger."

She observed Haymitch with disgust, taking in the lines of his face that made him look older than he actually was. Her mother had them too, as did most of the adults in Twelve. Any Capitol citizen, if they hadn't known of him already, would have pegged Haymitch as two decades older than he was.

He didn't say anything else. He couldn't, as they'd arrived at her family's house. Haymitch held the door open as the other men navigated their way indoors, depositing Gale on the kitchen table.

Katniss' concern for Gale won out, and she didn't notice when Haymitch slipped out of the house.

 **A/N: Ten more chapters to go!**


	22. Chapter 22

Katniss had been surprised when Prim pulled her attention away from Gale long enough to dab homemade ointment onto her eye. She hadn't forgotten the whip hitting her face, as the skin around her eye continued to sting, but she hadn't been focusing on it enough to even think of treating the wound.

She let Prim do what she wanted as her own attention remained focused on Gale. He was unconscious, but he whimpered each time her mother touched his back with medicine. The sound made her stomach tighten.

When the doorbell rang, Katniss glanced around the room, taking stock of who was there for the first time. Only her, her family, Gale, and Peeta.

She locked eyes with Peeta, surprised he was there. She hadn't realized he hadn't left with the others. He tried to smile at her before standing and going to open the door as the others continued their work.

One of the miners had stated their intention to inform Hazel of Gale's condition before he'd left, and Katniss was sure the knocker would turn out to be Gale's mother. When Peeta tugged the door open, however, it was Madge standing on the other side.

Katniss' gaze dropped to the tin grasped in her friend's hands, the same tin she'd watched Mrs. Undersee embrace more than a year ago. The sight of it unsettled her. Holding it unsettled Madge, too. Katniss could see that it was shaking in her hands.

Madge stepped into the house, her eyes wide as she took in the sight of Gale laid out across the table. She swallowed, her shoulders straightening before she thrust the tin towards Mrs. Everdeen, who looked at it with a frown.

"Mom said you could have it," Madge said, voice struggling to remain steady. "For him."

Her voice was choked as if she couldn't bring herself to say Gale's name after seeing him in such a state. But she tilted her head in his direction to emphasize her words.

Katniss' heart stuttered as she watched her mother take the tin. If Gale hadn't let out a particularly painful moan as Mrs. Everdeen lifted the lid, Katniss might have protested using the medicine.

Mrs. Everdeen glanced at her charge before nodding at Madge.

"Tell your mother that I said thank you."

With one quick nod, Madge turned back to the door, pausing long enough to offer a small smile to Katniss and Peeta. She was out the door before it had occurred to Katniss to say thank you.

"Interesting," Peeta murmured.

Katniss, looking for a distraction from Gale receiving his shot, looked at him with a furrowed brow.

"What's interesting?" she asked.

Peeta's gaze was on the door, and his lips were in a thin line.

"You and I both know that whatever's in that tin is the only morphling Mrs. Undersee has. Why give it to Gale? She doesn't even know him."

"Because Madge asked her to," Katniss responded quickly.

"Yeah, but why?" Peeta pushed. "Why would Madge care enough about Gale to put him before her own mother?"

"She's my friend," Katniss shot back, feeling suddenly and inexplicably offended. "She wants to help."

Peeta shrugged, but Katniss could tell she hadn't convinced him of anything.


	23. Chapter 23

Hazel arrived and hovered over Gale for an hour, asking questions while Mrs. Everdeen stood by and spoke to the other woman in a gentle, calming tone. Katniss watched.

The pain around her eye had morphed into a throbbing sensation deeper than the earlier sting, but she did her best to ignore it except when Prim handed her more ointment to spread across the welt. That provided some relief before the pain promptly returned. She couldn't imagine what Gale's back felt like.

When it grew dark, Hazel left to tend to her other children, leaving Gale in Mrs. Everdeen's care.

Peeta had gone home hours earlier, but Katniss remained sitting in the same chair she'd occupied since they'd deposited Gale's body on the table. She'd eaten when food was pushed into her hands and moved a few other times to make people happy or take care of business, but mostly, she sat watching Gale, though he slept through most of the evening.

Eventually, her mother and Prim went to bed, looking exhausted. Katniss remained sitting in the chair, ignoring her mother's assurances that Gale would be fine if she wanted to sleep.

His breathing was steady, and with the lashes on his back covered by bandages, she could almost pretend as if nothing was wrong.

The lie almost worked until Gale's eyes fluttered open, his face already contracted in pain. He lifted his head high enough to glance around the room, eyes straining to see in the darkness. Katniss leaned forward, hands on her knees, but otherwise did nothing but watch as Gale made sense of his surroundings.

It took what felt like ages for Gale's gaze to land on her. By then, he'd figured out whose house he was in, and his expression didn't change upon finding Katniss watching him. A second later, he let his head fall onto the table, letting out a sigh from the effort it had taken to hold it up.

"There's still some morphling," Katniss said, careful to keep her voice low to avoid waking her mother and sister. "Mom said you could have another dose if you woke up."

She'd never administered a shot before, but if he was in pain, she was willing to give it a try. Her mother made it look easy, and though Katniss knew there was a technique to it, she would have tried it if Gale was desperate enough for relief.

"No," Gale groaned. "I'm okay."

He didn't sound okay, but his lucidity was an indication that he was better than he'd been when they'd first gotten him to the house. That was enough.

They were quiet for a long time. Katniss stared at her hands, twisting them together as she failed to come up with something to say. The images of Thread raising his whip in one hand, of Gale crying out in pain when the leather struck him, still flashed through her mind.

"Thank you."

Katniss' head shot up. Gale had struggled to angle his face to look at her, though it remained pressed against the wood of the table.

"I'm not doing anything," she said. "Just sitting—"

"I didn't mean for this," he said. "Thank you for getting between me and Thread. It was stupid, but thank you."

Katniss' breath caught in her throat. She hadn't expected to be thanked. Gale couldn't have expected her to stand by and watch as he was whipped. She wasn't sure it would have occurred to her to thank him had their roles in the scenario been reversed.

"Don't mention it," she said.

Gale's eyes fluttered shut, and she knew he would be asleep within minutes.

Briefly, she wondered if she should mention Madge to him. She knew no one else had explained to Gale where the morphling had come from, and if he suspected when she'd mentioned it to him, he hadn't let on. But she didn't tell him. She only watched as he drifted back to sleep.

XXX

The first thing Katniss became aware of was a crick in her neck. She'd fallen asleep sitting in the same chair, and her head had fallen to one side. Before she'd opened her eyes, she straightened, wincing as the movement sent a fresh wave of pain down her neck.

It was enough to distract her from the lingering pain around her eye for a minute.

There was light coming through her eyelids, so she wasn't shocked when she opened her eyes to find her mom and sister up and about. She wasn't even surprised to see Gale awake, though she hadn't expected to see him sitting in a chair with what appeared to be a bowl of grits in front of him.

What surprised her was the other young man sitting at the table. The one who was watching Gale as if he was struggling with what to say until his eyes drifted over to Katniss and he realized she was awake.

Her mind hadn't entirely cleared when Peeta smiled at her, his eyes reflecting the afternoon light in a way they hadn't been moments before.

His posture straightened, and it was this that got the attention of Gale, who followed Peeta's gaze to Katniss. In contrast to Peeta, his expression didn't change much when he found her awake. His scowl actually deepened as his eyes traveled back to Peeta.

Katniss ignored the show of animosity. She also chose to ignore Peeta, not sure what to make of his presence.

"I didn't know we had cornmeal."

Her mother, who had been washing Gale's bloody bandages in the kitchen sink and hadn't noticed she was awake, jumped at the sound of her voice, one hand covering her heart.

It wasn't something that was difficult to get ahold of in the marketplace, but Katniss knew for a fact there hadn't been any in the cabinets the day before, and it seemed unlikely that her mother would have left Gale long enough to go buy it herself.

"Haymitch brought some by while you were sleeping." Mrs. Everdeen's tone was cautious, and she turned away from Katniss as she spoke. "He thought it was the kind of filling food you and Gale needed after yesterday."

"How nice of him."

Her mother cringed at the harshness in her voice.

"What's Haymitch Abernathy doing bringing us food?" Katniss asked.

"We went to school together," her mother said as if that would explain the man's sudden interest in giving them anything.

Before she could push her mother further, she caught Gale's gaze, and something about his look was enough to quiet her.

Peeta shifted uncomfortably in his seat, and Katniss did her best to give him a small grin of comfort, but the effort jolted her injured eye. What had been a dull soreness erupted into a sharp stinging pain. She hissed, and Prim was at her side in a flash, dabbing ointment onto her skin with gentle fingers.

Katniss let her work without complaint, allowing her eyes to flutter shut.

"That should help," Prim muttered as she pulled away.

Katniss chanced another grin, prepared this time, and was relieved when it felt marginally better. Her sister's return smile was hesitant.

Without any explanation, Katniss headed for the small bathroom attached to the other side of the house. She felt four sets of eyes on her back as she went.

Gale had probably been goaded into staying for a quicker recovery, but she couldn't piece together why Peeta was in their house.

She took her time in the restroom. Though she couldn't smell herself, she was sure others could. With everything that had happened the day before, she had hardly taken the time to use the restroom, let alone wash herself. She could taste her sleep in her mouth. She swished a mouthful of water around and spit it out before sticking her head under the tap to drink.

Knowing how the cost could add up, she was careful with the water, taking a bit and splashing it against her face.

A knock on the door made her stiffen.

"What?" she asked.

"Can I come in?"

It was her mother. Somehow, that calmed her.

"Sure."

She had turned back to the sink before her mother opened the door, but she didn't have anything to do anymore. She'd brushed her teeth. Her eye caught the hairbrush, and she reached for it. Reaching back, she tugged the elastic out of the hair and used the same hand to undo the braid.

She focused on removing the knots, trying to ignore her mother hovering behind her even as the woman appeared clear as day in the mirror that Katniss faced.

"Peeta came back early this morning," Mrs. Everdeen said.

She moved around Katniss to lean against the counter, and Katniss frowned at her own reflection. She didn't want to talk about Peeta, and she didn't understand why her mom would either.

"Okay," she replied.

"That boy has a good heart," Mrs. Everdeen said as if Katniss hadn't spoken.

Glancing over, Katniss watched her mother pick at her nails, something the woman often did when faced with a situation that she found too stressful. She made herself bleed sometimes.

Katniss reached out and tugged one of her mother's hands away from the other. Mrs. Everdeen's gaze cleared as Katniss' touch brought her back to the bathroom.

"Have I told you I went to school with this father?"

Katniss was starting to believe her mother had gone to school with everyone in the district, so she couldn't count herself surprised. She hummed in acknowledgement, tugging on a particularly difficult knot on the back of her head. Her mother noticed her struggle to reach it and took the brush from her hands, getting the knot worked out in no time at all, just as she'd always been able to do.

She continued brushing Katniss' hair as if it were calming her.

"I always liked Robb Mellark."

Katniss kept her eyes on the faucet.

"He was kind to me. We were close actually. I think he might have had a crush on me, but I only ever had eyes for your father. We didn't speak much after I married. He married Makayla not long after, and she'd never liked me. I knew better than to visit."

She didn't say anything more.

XXX

When Katniss and her mother re-entered the kitchen, it had been to find Prim regaling the boys with a lively tale of what she'd gotten up to the previous day. Katniss admired her steadfast dedication to ignore the tension between the boys as she spoke to both of them.

After her mother's words, Katniss had felt self-conscious and couldn't bring herself to look at Peeta for long. He'd left soon afterward, claiming he was needed at the bakery.

Gale had certainly cheered up after Peeta was gone, responding to Prim with enthusiasm instead of short sentences. Though the girl still couldn't get much out of Katniss.

It was another hour before there was a knock on the door, and Katniss' heart raced, thinking that Peeta had perhaps returned, not having been needed in the bakery after all.

Though her mother was the one to go for the door, Katniss straightened, trying to prepare herself for facing Peeta again. When it was Madge in the doorway, Katniss sagged feeling a strange mix of relief and disappointment.

"Madge," Mrs. Everdeen said in surprise. "How lovely to see you again."

Madge smiled nervously and nodded.

"Hi, Mrs. Everdeen."

She glanced past the woman. When her eyes landed on Gale sitting up and looking alert, her cheeks flushed. She glanced away, wringing her hands together.

"I wanted to make sure things were okay," she continued, addressing the woman in front of her and steadfastly not looking past her anymore. "Did the morphling work okay?"

Mrs. Everdeen smiled, reaching out to pat Madge on the shoulder.

"It did. Thank you, and tell your mother I said that as well."

Madge nodded and glanced behind her, fidgeting on her feet.

"You should come in," Mrs. Everdeen said before the girl could flee. "I can fix you some hot coffee before you head all the way back to town."

Madge hesitated for a moment but nodded, following Mrs. Everdeen inside and letting the door fall shut behind her.

"Hi," she said to the room at large, not looking at anyone in particular.

They echoed the greeting.

"I'm glad you're okay," Madge said to Gale as she settled into the chair across from him. "You too," she added to Katniss, gesturing towards her eye.

Katniss gave a short nod in response.

"The morphling came from you?" Gale asked.

Katniss tried to read the emotion in his voice, but she couldn't make sense of it. Madge nodded shyly, welcoming the distraction of Mrs. Everdeen setting a cup in front of her.

"She showed up right after we brought you here," Katniss said. "The morphling was her mom's."

"Thank you," Gale said. "It helped. That whipping… It wasn't like anything I'd felt before."

This time, Madge didn't look away from him, though her eyes crinkled around the edges in a wince.

"I'm sure not," she said softly, "It was...scary, seeing that. And for whatever it's worth, I think Thread was lying about the punishment. Dad said whippings aren't actually in the law as an acceptable punishment. Not in Twelve, at least."

Gale snorted.

"Thread doesn't care about the law, just his own ego and power. One whipping and I can tell you that."

Madge nodded, taking a sip of her coffee.

Gale turned to Katniss' mother.

"Did it really use to be like this? Before Cray?"

Mrs. Everdeen's lips thinned.

"Yes," she said. "It's not new. Any head peacekeeper will abuse their power. Material things made Cray feel powerful. Thread seems like one of those who likes violence. The only thing that changes is what they want."

"Will you still hunt?" Madge asked Gale.

He was surprised at the question. Madge was watching him, her eyes wide as she waited with baited breath.

"I don't know," he replied, eyebrows knitting together.

He turned to Katniss.

"How else will we survive?" she asked, feeling panic rising in her throat.

She hadn't stopped to think yet about whether it was safe to enter the woods anymore, let alone bring back game. Thoughts of a future with no source of food flooded her mind and wrapped her in anxiety that threatened to break through.

"We'll make do," Gale assured her. "I think we should try to hunt. We can be discreet. Who knows this place and its secrets better? Thread or us?"

"They've turned on the fence."

Katniss and Gale turned to look at Madge. She had bit down on her lip so hard that it was turning white.

"Thread told Dad about it this morning. The fence is supposed to be on at all times.

Gale cursed, going so far as to slam his fist against the table. Though the anger wasn't directed at Madge, she folded in on herself in her chair.

"I should go," she said after a few moments of uncomfortable silence. "Mom wanted me back. I promised I'd read to her."

She waved off Mrs. Everdeen's protests, thanking the woman as she pushed her mostly untouched cup of coffee into the woman's hands. Eventually, Mrs. Everdeen had no choice but to accept it.

"See you at school," Madge told Katniss with a nod, already standing at the door.

Katniss nodded back and watched as Madge disappeared out the door.

"She's always so quiet," Gale muttered.

Katniss raised an eyebrow.

"Everytime I talk to her, she gets like that," he said. "She's always running off when she doesn't need to."

"She's quiet," Katniss said, feeling defensive on Madge's behalf. "She eats lunch with me at school, you know that. She doesn't talk to anyone else. I guess she's just shy."

Gale shrugged and began ranting about the loss of their hunting grounds. Katniss let him formulate plans she already knew would be useless. She couldn't blame him for trying.


	24. Chapter 24

**A/N: I don't know how many of you reading this are big Gadge shippers, but if you are, this is for you.**

Tension radiated from every corner of the lunch room. Katniss wondered if it was her imagination or if the other students were as on edge as she was. There had been whippings since Gale's, each for different infractions, and it had taken Thread three days to burn the Hob to the ground.

Katniss had pulled Greasy Sae from the flames, supporting the woman as she coughed and struggled to breathe. Somehow, it had felt like almost nothing after Gale's punishment.

Even those who hadn't frequented the Hob were worried they would be found guilty of something. There wasn't a person in Twelve above the age of ten who hadn't broken the law at some pointin their lives. It was the only way they were alive.

She felt her classmates' eyes on her as she walked along the fringes of the cafeteria, tray clutched in her hands. If they hadn't seen her jump in front of Gale, they had heard about it soon after. Despite everything that had followed her and Thread's display, she was the star of the moment.

Peeta caught her eye from across the cafeteria and smiled. Everyone else at his table was watching her too. She reached up to tug at her braid as if it could hide her face from the curious eyes around her.

Glancing at their usual table, she saw that Madge had already taken her usual seat. She was one of the few people not watching Katniss. All she could see was Madge's back as the girl hunched over her tray and tried to blend into the wall.

With a sigh, Katniss made her way over, hoping that her sitting down would be enough for people to lose interest in her.

"Hey," she grunted as she slid onto the bench across from Madge.

Madge gave her a small nod and an attempt at a grin as she popped a small, falsely red cherry tomato into her mouth.

It took half of the lunch period before Madge spoke.

"How's Gale?"

She twirled her fork around in her beans instead of eating them, and she bit her lip much like she had when she'd visited the Everdeens several days before.

"He's fine," Katniss replied, eyes narrowing. "He's up and walking around. The mine's still too much for him, but he's building up his strength."

Madge exhaled, some of the tension in her shoulders dissipating.

"I know you've heard this a million times," Katniss continued, "but thank you for the morphling."

"It was my mother's," Madge said with a shrug. "Not mine."

"Still," Katniss said awkwardly.

She wasn't sure how to continue. There were a number of questions she'd have liked to get answers to, but she didn't relish the thought of voicing any of them. Especially when she wasn't sure how Madge would take them. They had eaten lunch together for years, but the few times Katniss had met Madge's mother was the most personal their relationship had ever gotten.

"Can I tell you something?"

Katniss was surprised it had been Madge to put forth the request.

"Sure," she replied, leaning forward.

Madge took a deep, shaky breath and quit spearing her beans to lay down her fork.

"I like Gale," she said, looking at her tray.

When Katniss didn't respond, Madge finally glanced at her.

"I thought you should know," she continued, the words tumbling out. "You're his best friend, and we're friends. It felt wrong not to mention it, I guess. I've wanted to tell you for months, but I didn't know how to. It's weird for me to say it. I've never admitted to liking anyone out loud before. Even saying it to myself when I was practicing was weird."

"It's fine," Katniss replied, cutting off Madge's rambling. "Really. Why would I care?"

Madge was taken aback both by the question and Katniss' defensive tone.

"I don't know," she said, sinking in on herself again. "I just thought I should tell you."

Katniss sighed and did her best to soften her mannerisms and voice. She hadn't meant to snap.

"I don't care," she said carefully. "If you want my...blessing or something, then you have it. If you want to confess to him, then do it."

"Has he," she fiddled with her napkin, tearing it on accident, "said anything about liking someone?"

Katniss couldn't stop herself from cringing.

"No," she said. "We don't talk about things like that."

Madge was frowning as if Katniss had told her Gale was seeing someone.

"But I don't think he's, like, involved with anyone," Katniss continued. "You should go for it."

She felt strange offering advice she'd never followed herself. She wasn't even sure what "going for it" entailed, but she'd heard the phrase used by others when they were talking about confessing their feelings. It seemed to happen frequently in Capitol television programs.

"Are you sure?"

It was tempting to roll her eyes, but Katniss managed to keep her face straight when she replied.

"If you want to."

If Madge was hoping that, with a little poking, Katniss would reveal Gale was madly in love with her, then she was sorely disappointed.

More than anything, Katniss wanted the bell to signal the end of lunch, but it didn't save her.

"Maybe I should tell him," Madge said. "I would at least know then, right? What's the worst that could happen?"

When she looked to Katniss for an answer, Katniss shrugged in response.

"I'll think about it," Madge decided, scooping up a forkful of beans and taking her first bite.


	25. Chapter 25

Katniss glanced over her shoulder for the tenth time in the last minute, making sure there was no one in sight. Though she wasn't breaking the law, she had no doubt Thread would love to catch her trailing along the side of the fence.

She wanted to find a spot that wasn't flowing with electricity, but she'd traversed the entire length of the fence only to be met with more buzzing.

More than a few times, she'd encountered peacekeepers and had to pretend as if she was doing something else. She was sure they were suspicious, but they were either sympathetic or knew the fence would do its job. Either way, they didn't stop her.

Giving up, Katniss made her way back to the street, prepared to head home. Once again, she'd be empty handed.

It had been days since they'd had any meat. Much of their diet had become tessarae bread, and Prim was losing weight before her eyes.

Her own stomach chose that moment to growl, and she covered it with a hand to stifle the sound.

Because she was on the road between Victor's Village and the Merchant's Quarter, she hadn't expected to see anyone. Only Haymitch used the road, and he had little reason to leave his house after his alcohol supply had been cut off with the burning of the Hob.

Apparently, though, the lack of alcohol had left him itching to involve himself in the lives of others.

Katniss paused when she saw the victor walking towards her. His gait was surprisingly steady, and he seemed remarkably alert, more so than she would have expected from him in either drunkenness or withdrawal.

"Checking out the fence?" he taunted. "You shouldn't bother, sweetheart. They've got us sealed up in here. You'd have a better chance of hitching a ride to the Capitol on one of the trains."

She kept walking, determined to ignore him and whatever wisdom he might try to bestow.

"I like you, kid," he said once she was one step past him.

It was enough to make Katniss turn around and look at him with a furrowed brow.

"I do," he continued. "You're more of a fighter than most. I admire that. That you managed as well as you did all those years is more than can be expected from most your age."

Katniss scoffed and turned her back on him.

"That doesn't matter anymore, does it?"

"It does. There are ways to survive that aren't hunting deer in the woods. Look how I did it."

He motioned at the house down the street that must have been the one he lived in. It looked just as neglected as each of the others. He gave a laugh at her reaction to it, earning himself a glare.

"I can give you food."

Katniss' eyes widened, but her disgust had them narrowing a second later.

"No. Why would I take food from you? Our family is fine. Whatever you want from me, I won't give it to you."

Haymitch shrugged.

"I'll give it to your mother then."

At Katniss' furious look, he smirked.

"Whatever you may think of me, I'm not a pushover."

"Why would you give us food?"

"Thread doesn't have enough authority to strip me of my paycheck, and he has even less to strip me of my savings. I buy my fair share of alcohol, the whole country knows that, but my habits don't put a dent in my income. I have more than enough sitting in that godforsaken house. Might as well do something with it."

"Why us?"

Katniss took a step closer, silently urging him to tell her the truth.

"Like I said, you interest me. That Hawthorne boy does too. You've both done a lot to survive, but surviving for you always meant putting food on the table, didn't it?" He didn't wait for an answer. "I can provide the food, but I know that won't take away your tenacity. If you don't need to try so hard to eat, then your attention can shift to...long term methods of survival."

Katniss took several frantic steps back.

"I don't know what you're talking about," she said, voice shaking.

"You and I both know that's a lie. I know the Hawthorne boy has said something to you. He pestered me for months, and I know he'd never keep you in the dark about his big ideas. You're the person he trusts most."

"No, I don't know anything."

She shook her head, taking several more steps away from Haymitch.

"My family won't take your food. We won't take anything from you. Leave us alone."

He didn't try to stop her as she hurried down the road towards town, refusing to look back.


	26. Chapter 26

There was a stranger in their house when Katniss returned home. She eyed him distrustfully, though he made a rather pathetic picture slumped over in the chair as he was. Her mother was applying ointment to his back. The smell of it had become a staple in their house over the past several weeks, but Katniss couldn't say she was fond of it.

She was even less fond of the stream of strangers coming and going every day.

Her mom gave her a warning look as she entered the house. Katniss scowled back. She'd only yelled at the last one for his inappropriate comments. It wasn't as if she was regularly chewing out the people who came for help.

She took her time pouring herself a cup of water, keeping her back turned for the several minutes it took before the man had slipped his shirt back on.

He hurried out the door once Mrs. Everdeen was finished, offering a slight nod in Katniss' direction.

"Did he pay you?" Katniss asked as soon as the door was shut behind him.

Her mother gave her the disapproving look that Katniss was becoming used to.

"It's not a dirty question. You're doing work, so you should expect to get paid. Working for free means starving, Mom."

"Not being able to afford medical care will kill them faster than starving does us," Mrs. Everdeen replied, her voice lighter than one might have expected from the conversation.

Katniss turned to place her glass in the sink.

"No one's dying from a whipping."

Mrs. Everdeen sat one of her vials down on the table forcefully, and her eyes narrowed as she looked at Katniss.

"That's where you're wrong. Any open wound can be deadly in the wrong conditions, and wrong conditions are easy to come by in Twelve."

Katniss continued to stare into the sink, her back to her mother. She'd been walking across a field of landmines and made a misstep.

"They pay me when they're able to, and that's enough. I'm happier to treat a man who can only pay me with a small tub of butter months later than someone from the Capitol who could pay me enough to buy a hovercraft."

Katniss' fingers gripped the edge of the sink so tightly that she was losing her feeling in them, yet she didn't let go.

"That's all well and good, but it's not going to feed us. And neither are the woods anymore. This is the only wayー"

"You know as well as I do that Prim would never let someone be turned away."

It was a smart move, using Prim against her.

"Fine," she bit out, not turning to face her mother. "I hope you enjoy watching your daughters starve for a second time."

She pushed herself out the front door before her mother could say another word.

XXX

Katniss could see the weight disappearing from Prim's body even as she and their mother worked to give her as much as they could.

Most of the food they had came from Gale, but with three siblings and a mother of his own to feed, his miner's salary didn't stretch very far. Katniss couldn't have brought herself to take anything from him that would come at the expense of his own family.

Some of her mother's newfound clients did pay. Most of them in actual food items instead of money, which Katniss couldn't complain about as long as it fed them. Their meals were strange combinations of whatever they'd been able to get their hands on, somewhat like the early days of Katniss' hunting when she hadn't quite got the hang of things and had brought home whatever she found first.

The mishmash of their meals didn't matter to Prim, who was still skipping home from school every day.

"Here comes Peeta," she said as she saw him approaching them from across the schoolyard.

Katniss turned and saw Madge walking with him. They were chatting while Madge fiddled with the cuff of her sleeve and kept glancing in the direction of her home. Peeta sensed her discomfort and waved goodbye, which was the only prompting Madge needed to scurry away, not glancing in Katniss' direction.

"What was that about?" Katniss asked once Peeta had joined them.

"Nothing in particular," he said. "I just hadn't talked to her in a while and thought I should say hello."

Katniss gave a short nod that seemed to make Peeta suspicious. He looked at her for a second before he continued speaking.

"I can't walk with you today. Mom's manning the bakery, and she was adamant that I come right after school. I'm probably too late already."

"Okay. That's fine."

Peeta continued to watch her like he saw through her quick dismissal, but he gave a short nod, smiled at the both of them, and left without another word.

"What was that about?" Prim asked as soon as he was gone.

She'd crossed both of her arms against her chest, and the way she tilted her head and frowned at Katniss succeeded in making her look even more disapproving. Katniss snorted at the picture it made.

"Nothing," she replied with a wave of her hand. "Come on. We should get home. I'm sure Mom could use your help."

Prim followed without complaint, but she didn't drop the subject.

"Was it about Madge?"

Katniss' head snapped around before she could control herself.

"Why would it be about Madge?"

Prim shrugged, but there was a grin on her lips that hinted at her satisfaction.

"You got all huffy when you saw her talking to Peeta. Why? She's your friend."

"She is."

She reached out to tug at Prim's school shirt, which had come untucked. Prim swatted her hand away but took the cue to fix it.

"It's nothing," Katniss continued.

"Obviously it's something."

Prim got in front of her, cutting off her path home. Katniss narrowed her eyes, mentally noting that Prim had, at some point, begun to compete with her in height. While Katniss was still taller, it was by far less than before, and she didn't have to tilt her head far to gaze down at her sister.

"Madge told me she has feelings for Gale, so I guess I just feel a bit weird seeing her right now."

Prim leaned away from her.

"Likes him? Do you mean she _like_ likes him?"

Katniss' brow crinkled.

"I guess that's what I'm saying. She likes him like she wants to date him."

"Interesting."

Prim tapped her chin, falling silent as she considered the new information. Katniss raised an eyebrow, and when Prim looked back at her, her grin fell into a frown.

"Why does that bother you? You don't like Gale like that."

The bluntness of the statement took Katniss back. For a second, all she could do was stand frozen, but she recovered quickly, pushing past Prim to continue the walk home.

"I don't know," she said simply.

Prim hurried after her.

"Is it because you're jealous your best friend might get a girlfriend and spend less time with you? Shayna got mad at Andrea for the same thing last month. It took a week before they would talk to each other again."

Katniss grimaced at the accusation that she was as emotionally volatile as a middle schooler.

"Maybe," she said, wanting to end the conversation as soon as possible.

"I think so," Prim replied as if that settled everything. "You definitely don't like Gale. The two of you'd be terrible together. It would be like when Shayna dated Eli and they couldn't stop fighting. Peeta's way better for you."

Katniss froze again, watching Prim's back as she got farther away. Prim looked back with a satisfied smile. After a moment, Katniss shook her head and pushed on.

XXX

As soon as she saw him approaching her at the end of the school day, Katniss knew Peeta didn't want to tell her something. She watched him as he made his way towards her, frequently tossing glances to his right or left so he wasn't looking at her.

"What's up?" she asked once he'd come to a stop in front of her.

He hesitated for a moment, fingers flexing towards the straps of his backpack a few times before he tugged it off his shoulders.

As soon the loaf of bread was peeking out at her from the bag, she felt her heart stutter.

"It's stale this time," he apologized.

"Stale, burnt. It's still bread," Katniss said. "Is this what you usually eat?"

Peeta shrugged uncomfortably, shifting the loaf between his hands when Katniss didn't make an immediate move to take it.

"Sometimes," Peeta said. "This is white bread, sometimes it's wheat or sourdough."

Katniss reached out and gripped Peeta's forearm. She pushed it, and the bread, towards him.

"I can't take your food, Peeta."

He tensed but maintained a resolve that made it clear he had expected her to argue with him on this and wasn't planning to back down.

"I can survive without one loaf of bread, and don't think I went without food entirely. I ate my potatoes and my lunch."

"So did I," Katniss cut in.

It was the only food she'd had that day. They'd taken to eating only dinner as a family, and there was no doubt the bread would complement the meal well. But it wouldn't do her conscience good to know Peeta had lost a meal of his own for it.

"Katniss," Peeta said softly. "I'd feel so much better if you took it than if I ate it. Really, you'd be doing me a favor. Even if you had Prim eat it by herself."

With a sigh, Katniss took the loaf from him. She felt strange holding it, almost as if a peacekeeper would strap her to the whipping post if they saw her with it despite it breaking no laws that she knew of.

The thought led her to hastily open her bag and slip the bread inside, but the bulge it created still left her feeling conspicuous.

Prim chose that moment to skip up to them, and Katniss was certain her eyes flickered to Katniss' bag before she smiled at the two of them.

"Peeta gave us bread," was Katniss' chosen greeting.

Prim's eyes widened at the strange statement before she offered Peeta a small grin that made it seem like such gifts were everyday occurrences.

"Thank you," she said. "Your family makes the best bread I've ever tasted."

Katniss bit back the retort that Peeta's family made the only bread Prim had ever tasted that wasn't made with cheap tesserae grain.

She glanced back at Peeta and frowned at how satisfied he looked. When he caught her eye, he did his best to hide that satisfaction, but it was too late. Katniss huffed and took off in the direction of home, knowing Prim and Peeta would follow.

If she actually felt more warmth than annoyance, she didn't want Peeta to see it written all over her face.


	27. Chapter 27

Katniss glanced around the house at the knock on the door. Her mother and Prim were gone, off to find the ingredients they needed to make more of their ointment that had become crucial. It was taking longer for them to scrounge up the ingredients each time they went as others in the district learned of their usefulness and set to trying to make the ointment themselves.

She waited for a moment to see if it was one of them on the other side of the door, but when another knock sounded, she rose to answer it. Gale stood on the other side.

"Hi," he said, rubbing the back of his neck. "Do you have time to talk?"

Katniss hesitated before nodding and stepping aside to let him in. Gale took the seat across from where Katniss' open school book laid on the table. He tried to appear casual, but his body was tense as he watched Katniss retake her own seat.

"What is it?" she asked.

In the past, most of their honest conversations had taken place in the woods, but they hadn't been in the woods for more than a month. Since then, they'd had little more than brief conversations in private, and for once, Katniss hadn't planned to see Gale at all, though it was Sunday.

Gale looked at his fiddling fingers instead of at Katniss. In an attempt to mitigate the awkwardness she felt, Katniss let her eyes fall to her textbook.

"You know how Madge brought me that morphling after I was whipped?"

Katniss looked up from something about District 11's agricultural system and nodded.

"It wasn't much at first," he said. "I happened to see her walking down the street one day, and I knew she'd been nice enough to help Prim when she needed it. I figured I'd say hello. That day she nearly ran away from me, so I'm not sure why I kept saying hello, but I did.

"It was like that for a while. I'd say hi whenever I saw her and nothing more, but after a while, she got comfortable and would talk actually talk to me. A few months ago, we started meeting up sometimes. Usually when you were off with Peeta on Sundays."

The dismissive way Gale waved his hand at the mention of Peeta made Katniss scowl, but she didn't interrupt his story.

"Why tell me all this now?" she asked.

Gale shrugged, still unable to look at her.

"Even though it was never supposed to be a secret, I felt like I was keeping one because it had never come up."

"Why?" Katniss pressed. "It's not like I need to know every single person you talk to. You have plenty of friends that aren't me."

Gale clenched his jaw.

"I don't know. You're my best friend, and she's your friend too. I thought maybe I should at least mention that we'd gotten to know each other."

"Why would I care if you and Madge are friends?"

Gale looked at her, pain in his eyes.

"Wait." Katniss took a deep breath. "You are just friends, right?"

Gale looked away from her again, shifting nervously.

"We're just friends," he said. "Nothing else has ever happened with us. All we do is talk."

"But you want it to be more."

With a sigh, he shrugged.

"I don't know what will happen in the future. Madge is a nice girl. I do like her. It's not… I'm not going to ask her out tomorrow, but I'd be lying if I said that the possibility hadn't crossed my mind."

"So, what are you telling me this for? Are you looking for permission to date her?"

Gale huffed. His eyes narrowing.

"No, I'm not. I don't think it's wrong of me to want to be more open with you about things. Katniss, you remember everything I said to you, right? About how I felt about you? None of it was a lie, and it's not as if it's just disappeared. I'm not suddenly in love with Madge. I just wanted to talk to you about what's been going on."

"You should tell her how you feel," Katniss said, leaning forward in an attempt to maintain eye contact as Gale continued to avoid doing so. After a few moments, he nodded.

"Maybe one day when I'm more sure of it myself."

He leaned over the table to get a better look at her textbook.

"Are you working on Civics homework?" he asked in disgust.

Katniss smirked.

"Do you want to help me with it?"

XXX

Gale had left by the time her mother and Prim made it back. Katniss was about to go out and search for them herself when the door swung open and she was met with her mother hunched over and supporting an ashen Prim's weight.

Katniss rushed forward and took her place at Prim's other side, hurrying her to one of the beds. Prim collapsed onto the mattress, sighing as her head hit the pillow. She burrowed into the blankets, but her relief was short lived when her discomfort returned at full force.

"What's wrong?" Katniss asked.

Prim had been coughing a bit more than usual when they'd set out, but it hadn't been like this.

"Nothing that hasn't been wrong before," her mother assured her.

Mrs. Everdeen hurried into the kitchen to gather what medicine they had.

"When did it come on?" Katniss asked, moving away from a barely coherent Prim to join her mother at the kitchen counter.

"Not long after we got to town.".

The majority of her attention was focused on the greenish substance she was mixing together in a bowl. Katniss, who had watched her make it a million times, handed her one of her vials before she could reach for it. Her mother gave her a strained smile before she added a drop to the bowl.

"And it took you this long to get back?"

Mrs. Everdeen gave a short shake of the head.

"It didn't start out like this. Prim insisted we get the supplies, and I didn't think she was going to get like this. As soon as it became clear she was, we began to head back, but it was difficult to support her on my own."

Katniss inwardly cursed herself for not leaving as soon as she'd begun to grow worried.

"No one offered to help?"

"It was already getting late. You know no one stays out past dusk anymore."

"How many peacekeepers did you pass?"

"A few," she said. "Many of them might have been sympathetic. It's impossible to tell with those helmets they've started wearing."

Prim whimpered, and Mrs. Everdeen hurried to her, bowl and spoon clutched in her hands.

"Help me sit her up."

Katniss didn't hesitate to obey the order. Carefully, she pulled Prim into a sitting position, keeping her arms around the younger girl's waist. Prim's eyes fluttered open.

"Prim, I need you to open your mouth," Mrs. Everdeen urged.

Prim obeyed, taking the medicine and swallowing with difficulty. Katniss felt her body shake as she shuttered.

"One more," Mrs. Everdeen pushed, getting a second spoonful into her mouth.

Mrs. Everdeen's body sagged once the second mouthful had been swallowed. She nodded at Katniss, who lowered Prim's head back onto the pillow.

The girl curled up in a ball.

Katniss reached out to touch her forehead.

"She has a fever," she said.

Mrs. Everdeen, who was moving around the kitchen once more, nodded.

"She's had one. It came on fast."

Katniss hoped that meant it would leave quickly too, but she wouldn't count on such luck.

 **A/N: Since you can't see the chapter count on here like you can on AO3, I feel like I should point out that there are now four chapters left in the story.**


	28. Chapter 28

**A/N: There's a sexual harassment warning for this chapter. It comes in implied comments and looks, but it's very much implied.**

Prim's illness worsened over the following days. The top priority was keeping Prim as strong as she could be, and Katniss felt herself growing weaker as she gave up as much food as she could to feed Prim.

Meanwhile, the weather grew colder as winter drew closer. Katniss was convinced the chill settled in earlier than in past years.

As she sat waiting for Peeta on the edge of the school grounds, she held her jacket close to her body, trying to hold onto her own body heat.

School had ended hours ago, but some students still came and went as she sat there. A few of the most dedicated spent time in the library after classes. Katniss was unsurprised when most who were leaving were blonde-haired. They could be home easily before the peacekeepers amped up their patrolling. Children from the Seam had left long ago.

She only had a few minutes before Peeta would be free of the bakery when she noticed Thread patrolling. It took him longer to catch sight of her, but when he did, his face broke into a smirk and his gait quickened as he zeroed in on her.

Since the incident with Gale, Katniss had avoided Thread at all costs, but every so often, he would catch sight of her in a crowd and give her that same smirk that sent unpleasant shivers down her spine. So far, she had eluded him, but this time, she had nowhere to go. She kept her gaze on the bakery as Thread approached, willing Peeta to appear.

"Katniss Everdeen."

The hair on her arms raised at the satisfied way in which Thread said her name. It was the first time she'd heard it from his mouth, and she would have been satisfied if it were the last.

Though it pained her, she looked up at him. There was no way she was facing a public whipping because she'd refused to show the Head Peacekeeper the respect he ardently chased. Keeping her expression blank and her her mouth tightly closed, she waited for him to make his next move.

"How is Mr. Hawthorne?"

Katniss' eyes narrowed before she could stop them.

"He's fine."

"Yes," Thread went on as if they were discussing the weather. "I've heard he's back in the mines. It takes someone strong to do such dangerous work. See, my punishment couldn't have been too extreme if Mr. Hawthorne made an easy comeback, could it?"

At first, she didn't respond, but Thread raised an eyebrow and continued to stare.

"I suppose not, sir," she replied curtly.

"There, see? I'm glad we can come to an understanding."

Katniss gave him a short nod and took to staring at the ground. All was quiet between them for a moment, and Katniss grew hopeful that he would walk away without another word. Instead, he took a step closer, causing Katniss' body to seize up like a tightened coil.

"I hear your sister isn't doing well."

Ice coated Katniss' veins. She didn't dare look in Thread's eyes and see the menacing look that accompanied the way he was towering over her. She felt like the deer they used to hunt in the woods.

Thread was enjoying this, and that knowledge left her feeling nauseous.

"She's been in bed for a week," Katniss admitted.

Thread had enough connections that there was no sense lying about it. She was sure lying to a peacekeeper about even the most mundane of things was against some rule, either Thread's or the Capitol's.

"I see," Thread said. "By the looks of you, her illness is taking a toll on the whole family. What a shame. I imagine you could all do with a nice, filling meal. When was the last time you had one of those, Miss Everdeen?"

Katniss shrugged. She'd taken to staring at Thread's shoes, noting that they were coated with dry mud. She wondered why he didn't wash them more often when he was overly concerned with the rest of his uniform appearing absolutely spotless. The crisp white of his jacket glowed against the darkening sky.

"Can't even remember?"

Thread clucked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. Katniss suddenly felt less like a deer and more like a pet dog Thread was preparing to scold for disobedience.

"Do you know what's available to peacekeepers, Miss Everdeen?"

She wished he'd stop saying her name. Every time he did so, his enjoyment of this was palpable in the air between them.

"A lot of things, I'm sure, sir."

"Yes, a lot of things. One of those things is any medicine needed by either me or one of my soldiers. The Capitol doesn't even require a check up with anyone but our trained, on-site doctor, and, as his superior, I really require no check up at all."

Her curiosity got the better of her. She met Thread's gaze with a frown.

"That must be wonderful."

Thread hummed in agreement.

"There's also no one around to monitor who takes the medicine I request. No one except our trained doctor, of course."

Katniss didn't respond this time, just watched him.

"You must think I hate you," he continued, "but I admire both you and Hawthorne. There's a tenacity in both of you that is incredibly beneficial if used correctly. Poaching, however, is a waste of your spirit. It may help you in the short term, but it would never get you ahead in life."

"With all due respect, sir, I don't know that it's possible to get ahead of anything in Twelve."

Thread sneered.

"It's difficult to be sure, but there are always ways for those willing to play the right games."

He tilted his head to one side as he looked at her. His eyes traveled the length of her body, and Katniss shrunk away from him involuntarily, her shoulders hunching over.

"Oh, hello, sir."

Katniss' head shot up. She'd become consumed with the anxiety Thread created in her and forgotten that Peeta was meant to be meeting her. Thread hadn't been expecting more company either if the slight raise of his eyebrows was any indication. His eyes narrowed as he inspected Peeta, recognizing him from previous encounters.

"Mr. Mellark," he greeted, almost as if he weren't sure how polite he should be with the son of the town bakers, especially the one that dared to approach him when he was busy. "Aren't your parents in need of assistance?"

It was a clear dismissal, but Peeta feigned ignorance.

"Oh, no. I just left the bakery. My shift's done for the day. Homework time, I'm afraid. I really am sorry to interrupt, sir, but see, you're talking to my partner for our big history project. We're meant to be writing a report on what we think is the Capitol's greatest achievement. I have plenty of material to work with, but to be honest, sir, I'm more of an idea person than a writer. Katniss is much better at putting pen to paper, and if I don't get an A on this one, I may never leave the bakery again."

Thread stared Peeta down for what felt like a lifetime, but Peeta didn't back down, keeping his face earnest and, somehow, innocent.

When Thread took a large step away from her, Katniss almost audibly sighed in relief. His gaze flickered between Katniss and Peeta as if he were analyzing them.

"I'll leave you to it then," he concluded, walking away without glancing back.

"I can't believe you did that," Katniss whispered as soon as Thread was out of earshot.

She resisted the urge to throw her arms around Peeta in gratitude.

"Neither can I," said Peeta. "I thought for sure he was going to whip me."

"But the project?" Katniss asked, suddenly accusatory. "You don't think he'll ask Ms. Hayes about it?"

Peeta shrugged.

"Maybe. I don't think it'll matter. Ms. Hayes may be the most loyal citizen in Twelve, but not even she's a fan of Thread. Course, she may actually give us the assignment in retaliation, but I'll take it."

XXX

Her heart hadn't calmed by the time she made it home.

The atmosphere of the house was a far cry from what it had been in previous months. Her mother was hovering over Prim when Katniss opened the door. There were no other visitors like Katniss had become accustomed to seeing since Thread's arrival. There hadn't been any in the week since Prim had taken ill.

How the men and women Thread regularly whipped in the town square were treating their wounds, Katniss wasn't sure. They had relied heavily on her mother before. Her past frustrations with her mother rarely taking payment had been eclipsed by the patients' absences.

"Have you seen anyone today?" Katniss asked quietly, trying not to disturb Prim.

Her mother gave her a sharp look, calling to mind the past two nights when Katniss had asked the same question. Mrs. Everdeen didn't respond as she came to the sink, sterilizing the thermometer she'd used to record Prim's temperature.

"Mrs. Carbones stopped by," she replied once the thermometer was set aside. She wasn't looking at Katniss. "Her youngest was whipped this morning, grabbed on his way to the mines for something or other. Not even he knew. She kept him at home where he was as comfortable as could be considering the circumstances, but I gave her some medicine to take back with her."

"And payment?"

Mrs. Everdeen sighed, taking her time wiping her hands against her apron.

"She brought tessa rae grain."

Katniss reached up to tug the cabinet open, seeing that, sure enough, there was more grain there than that morning.

It shouldn't have bothered her. It really shouldn't have. The grain was filling, and it was food. It wasn't meat or vegetables or money, but it was more than they'd have otherwise. More importantly, it truly was all that most of the district could afford to give them.

"I tried to make her keep some, but she refused. She wouldn't see to it that I got any less."

Katniss wanted to lash out. She could feel the desire bubbling up inside her, but she didn't have anything to say to her mother. She would never have characterized Mrs. Carbones' payment as anything but steep, and there was nothing her mother could have done. She could see the exhaustion in her mother's demeanor that came from caring for Prim for the past week. It was more than she'd expected of her mother in years.


	29. Chapter 29

Dread filled Katniss' stomach when the knock sounded. She glanced around the house as if her mother would appear, though she knew she'd gone into town to buy more ingredients for Prim's medicine. There was no one else there to speak to whoever was on the other side, as Prim lay in bed half asleep.

Taking a deep breath, Katniss tugged the door open, preparing herself to come face-to-face with someone half wounded who she would have to turn away. There was no medicine here to help them—her mother hadn't had time to make anything new lately—let alone a healer who could work their magic.

But when the door opened, it wasn't someone in pain on the other side; it was Hazel Hawthorne.

Katniss blinked a few times as she processed the woman's presence. It had been a long time since she'd seen Hazel. In the past, she'd dropped by the Hawthorne residence a few times a month to check in and see if they needed anything, but it must have been at least three months since she'd last done so.

Gale was rarely home, and there was never game to drop off anymore. She hadn't had a reason to visit, though speaking to Hazel might have been reason enough to go anyway if she'd stopped to consider the idea.

"Katniss," Hazel greeted, a soft smile on her lips.

There had always been something naturally warm about Hazel, even when she was stern. In many ways, Katniss envied Gale for having her as a mother. Hazel was an archetype of a mother. Though Katniss had long since gotten over her own mother's shortcomings, part of her still wished, as she had years ago, that Hazel had been her mother instead.

Not even in her darkest moments had she let on to her mother that she'd held such a desire. It was one of her closest kept secrets.

"Hazel, hi," Katniss returned.

The awkward greeting didn't make Hazel drop her kind smile. She motioned over Katniss' shoulder.

"Mind if I step inside for a moment?" she asked, taking half a step forward before Katniss' mind caught up and she took her own step back to allow Hazel into the kitchen.

It was only then that Katniss realized Hazel was carrying a sack. It looked like one of the bags Gale had used for hauling game, and it looked half as full as it would have been if she and Gale were on their way back from the woods.

Without a word, Hazel sat the sack on top of the kitchen table and unknotted the opening. Katniss could do nothing but stare as Hazel pulled out several containers of food, some cooked and some not.

Just as Katniss was about to protest, Prim began to cough. Both Katniss and Hazel turned to watch the girl, poised to intervene, but the coughing stopped before they could do anything.

"Your family could use this," Hazel said quietly, placing a couple tomatoes on the counter. "The market was offering a good price for chicken thighs, so I brought along some of that. There's at least enough for the three of you to make one meal out of it."

Katniss felt tears prick at her eyes as she watched Hazel place the chicken in the otherwise empty refrigerator. The woman knelt down beside the fridge, plugging it into the nearest outlet. The sound of it humming nearly broke Katniss.

"You really don't have to do this," Katniss said, embarrassed by how desperate her voice sounded. "Your family needs food as much as we do."

"My children are fine. Between my work and Gale's and your mother's, no one is going to starve, not a Hawthorne and not an Everdeen."

There was a finality to her voice that kept Katniss from protesting further. Her voice was thick when she spoke.

"Thank you."

Hazel smiled at her once more, stepping forward and patting her twice on the shoulder before she deposited her last gift in the middle of the kitchen table: three heavily bruised peaches.

They were reaching the end of their shelf life, but Katniss felt a few tears break free at the sight of them. It had been years since she'd eaten a peach that hadn't been canned. The overly syrupy orange cubes they were sometimes served at school felt worlds away from the few fresh peaches Katniss had enjoyed in her life.

She couldn't say anything else to Hazel, but the woman didn't expect her too. She folded up her empty bag and held it close to her chest, giving Katniss one last nod and smile before she disappeared out the door and left Katniss to pull herself together in peace.

XXX

The sun had set by the time Katniss let herself through the door. She'd walked the perimeter of the district until she could hardly stand anymore, staying far enough away from the fence that none of the peacekeepers would suspect her of anything. It didn't stop them from leering at her as she passed them.

Pure physical exhaustion was the only thing capable of getting her to sleep, and her eyes fluttered closed even as she remained standing. She walked towards her bed from memory alone, but before she could collapse, she realized her mother was sitting in a chair beside it, hunched over.

She was asleep, Katniss asserted after several bewildered seconds of looking at her. A new rush of adrenaline kept her eyes open, and she noticed her mother was gripping Prim's hand. Something must have happened again. Katniss felt her exhaustion rising once more.

Her eyes glanced at her mother's bed, empty aside from rustled sheets. Shaking her head, Katniss wandered over and dropped down into it, not letting her thoughts wander before she could drift off to sleep.

XXX

It couldn't have been more than an hour when the high-pitched cry sent Katniss jolting up in bed. She was disoriented at first, having expected to find herself on the other side of the room, and she'd kicked off her mother's sheets before she remembered where she'd fallen asleep.

Her mother was standing, but she was hovering as close to Prim as she had been when Katniss had arrived in the house late into the night.

Prim was awake and restless. Katniss realized it was her cry that had woken her. She stood, panicked but unsure of what to do. Her mother's hands were shaking as she fumbled with a vial and tried to get a squirming Prim to drink it.

"What should I do?" Katniss asked in little more than a whisper.

Her fingers flexed as if they should be reaching for something, but there was nothing for them to grab ahold of.

"I've got it," her mother responded without glancing her way.

Katniss' fingers still twitched with the need to do something. She backed towards the door. In her exhaustion, she hadn't changed from her clothes before falling asleep.

As soon as the cool autumn night touched her skin, she shivered. It invigorated her. Her heart pounded as images of Prim's pained face ran through her mind.

She ran. She didn't realize it was the bakery she was running towards until she was halfway there.


	30. Chapter 30

At the pace Katniss was running, she worked up a sweat despite the cool night. Though she stayed silent as she ran, it surprised her that she didn't pass any patrolling peacekeepers. She'd assumed they patrolled throughout the entire night, but that didn't seem to be the case.

She was outside the bakery before she realized she had no way of getting to Peeta without waking his entire family. Though it deepened her anxiety, it didn't stop her from rapping her knuckles against the door.

It took two knocks before a light came on in the back of the bakery.

Mrs. Mellark had made it downstairs first. Her face was flushed with rage and her robe only loosely tied around her as she stormed across the bakery.

Peeta was right behind his mother, and his panicked look made Katniss suspect he'd had an idea, somehow, about who his mother was about to find.

As Mrs. Mellark flung the door open, Katniss realized that tears were dripping down her cheeks. She swatted at them in a pointless attempt at appearing more put together than she was.

"How dare you wake us up at such an hour."

Mrs. Mellark's voice was low, which only served to make her scarier. She cast her eyes behind Katniss, checking for observers.

"We have business hours for a reason."

"She's not here to buy bread, Mom."

Katniss looked at him, eyes wide. She'd never been the direct target of Mrs. Mellark's anger before, and she fully believed that Peeta's comment had been as foolish as it was brave. The glare he directed at his mother was even more so.

The woman was taken aback by Peeta's boldness, but she was quick to reign it in.

Katniss caught sight of Mr. Mellark hovering in the doorway to the back room. His face was obscured in shadow, and he made no move to approach his irate wife.

"One would assume," Mrs. Mellark shot back to Peeta. "She won't be buying much of anything any time soon."

She said it with disdain, though the majority of the district could count on one hand how many times they'd made a purchase at the bakery. Those from the Seam certainly weren't their target customer base though they comprised most of the district.

"She's my friend."

Peeta took several steps forward, squeezing past his mother to join Katniss on the porch. Katniss felt a prick of annoyance when she realized he was shielding her like no one had bothered to do for him.

"My friends have a right to visit me," he said.

Mrs. Mellark tilted her nose upward.

"If I were going to forbid you from seeing the girl, I'd have done it a long time ago. But, the rest of this family has a right to sleep in peace without wayward girls banging on the door."

She took a step forward, and Katniss was certain she intended to hit Peeta. Katniss moved to step around him, but Mrs. Mellark froze, her eyes widening as they focused on something behind Katniss.

"Everything okay here?"

A shiver traveled down Katniss' spine. People didn't sneak up on her, but in her heavy emotions and fear of Mrs. Mellark, she hadn't noticed the peacekeeper approaching the bakery. She turned to face him with the rest of the Mellarks. This peacekeeper wasn't one whose name she knew. He was likely one of the new recruits who had come with Thread directly from Two. He had the air of one who still held grand notions of his noble position.

Often, Katniss had found, they were the most lenient, and it was clear Mrs. Mellark held the same belief as she put on her best smile.

"Of course it is," she said with a smile. "My family would never cause any trouble, sir. We're upstanding citizens of Twelve."

The peacekeeper gave a short nod, but his gaze moved to Katniss, taking in her olive skin and dark eyes and hair that marked her as being from the Seam. One of his eyebrows raised in a question.

"This is the older Everdeen girl," Mrs. Mellark informed him, not hiding her scowl.

Her use of Katniss' last name sparked recognition in the peacekeeper's eyes. Katniss shifted on her feet, unconsciously putting herself closer to Peeta. Her arm brushed his, and he surprised her by reaching out to grasp her hand. Katniss gave his a slight squeeze and held on.

One side of the peacekeeper's lips quirked upwards when he noticed the gesture. Mrs. Mellark looked as if she were trying to set them on fire with her mind for daring to be so scandalous.

"She's a classmate of my son's," the woman said, struggling to keep a smile on her face. "She's a troublemaker, as you know, but my son is, unfortunately, taken with her. I promise she's not a danger, and I've raised him not to fall for her dangerous rhetoric. It's just the hormones. He'll get over it."

Mrs. Mellark's words amused the peacekeeper even more. He was holding back a laugh as he gave a short nod of his head.

"We all fall for a rebel at some point in our lives," he joked. "It's all part of growing up."

The crease on Mrs. Mellark's forehead hinted that she disagreed, but not even she dared to voice disagreement with a peacekeeper.

"If the girl's not bothering you, I'll be on my way."

The peacekeeper gave one more nod of his head and continued down the street.

Katniss looked back at Mrs. Mellark, wondering why the woman hadn't let the peacekeeper take her away. The older woman didn't notice her looking, too busy scowling at what she could still see of the peacekeeper's back in the dark.

When the man was out of sight, she redirected her scowl at them.

"Be quiet," she snapped. "And don't wake anyone up when you come back inside."

With that last comment directed at Peeta, she turned her back on them and went inside, nearly slamming the door behind her. Her husband could no longer be seen, and Mrs. Mellark soon disappeared into the backroom, the light flicking off moments later.

Katniss' heartbeat slowed as she realized neither of them would be struck by Mrs. Mellark that night. The fear of it had almost been enough to strike Prim from her mind, but it came rushing back to her when she turned to Peeta and saw him watching her with wide, concerned eyes.

"What is it? What's wrong with Prim?"

Her heart stuttered at his concern. She took a deep, shaking breath, glad his hand still grasped hers as her knees wobbled beneath her.

She recounted the night's events in a shaky voice, pausing at odd moments to collect herself. Peeta moved closer as she spoke, his free hand finding its way to her waist and warming her against the chill of the air.

It was the most they'd ever touched, and Katniss was surprised at how much she welcomed it. She hadn't been physically affectionate with anyone except Prim since she'd begun rejecting her mother's attempts after their near starvation.

By the time she'd finished the story, she couldn't find any more words inside herself. Luckily, Peeta didn't have a need for words. He gathered Katniss to his chest as though she were crying.

She wasn't, though she felt like she should have been. She sunk into the embrace, trying to focus on the way Peeta's hand stroked her back instead of the sight of Prim struggling to breathe.

XXX

Each wheezing breath from Prim made Katniss' heart tighten. Her eyes had been locked on Prim for hours despite Prim being unconscious.

Her sister hadn't had a normal sleeping schedule for more than two weeks. She faded in and out of sleep at the whims of her lungs and the rest of her body. But even when she was awake, they were lucky if she was cognizant enough to hold a conversation, and anything she said was eventually interrupted by coughing.

Katniss, of course, hadn't had much reliable sleep either. If the coughing throughout the night hadn't been enough to wake her, her anxiety would have been. The continual ache in her stomach as a consequence of giving almost all her food to Prim only aggravated what was already a painful situation.

She had blown off school for days, and she was dreading the day when the peacekeepers knocked on their door demanding to know why both girls in the Everdeen household weren't getting their daily indoctrination.

The whole peacekeeping force knew the answer, but that wouldn't stop them from coming. Even when Cray had been in charge, Katniss had attended school with a girl who had been so weak they'd had to carry her from class to class themselves. All of Twelve blamed the peacekeepers for her death, which occurred not long after she'd returned to school.

The officers had monitored her funeral, prepared for a riot to break out. All that had happened were a lot of angry glares and snide, whispered comments.

Katniss hadn't been prepared to riot over that girl, but she thought she might have gone at it alone if it were Prim in that girl's place.

Prim let out a soft whimper, turning over in the bed.

It was the middle of the afternoon. Katniss had done her best to darken the house, but light leaked through the thin yellow curtains that had hung across their windows for as long as Katniss could remember.

The knock on the door startled her. She blinked several times before she turned her head towards the sound.

It wasn't until a second round of knocking began that Katniss stood, driven by the sudden realization that the noise held the potential to wake Prim.

She made the trip to the door in several long strides and tugged it open.

Her attempts to darken the house had been more successful than she had realized. Her eyes stung when confronted with the afternoon sun. It took several seconds for her to realize that it was Peeta and Madge standing in front of her.

"What are you doing here?"

Madge winced, and Katniss wished the words hadn't come out as sharp as they had. She was surprised, not angry, to see them. It felt like it had been ages, though it had only been several days since she'd last bothered to attend school. Time was beginning to lose meaning, even as she tried to maintain some semblance of a circadian rhythm.

With shaking hands, Madge held out a small tin, not unlike the one her mother had once toted around. This one, however, was smaller and wasn't showing the same signs of rust.

"What is this?" Katniss asked, dreading the answer.

"Medicine," Peeta replied, drawing Katniss' eyes to him.

He wouldn't make eye contact.

"For Prim," he continued. "It's to help."

Katniss eyed the tin distastefully. There was scarcely any medicine in Twelve that didn't pass through her mother's hands. What did exist was mostly in the hands of Mrs. Undersee, delivered straight from Two.

"Where did you get this?" Katniss asked, still not taking the tin though Madge continued to hold it towards her.

Madge and Peeta shared a look before Madge answered.

"Haymitch Abernathy."

She said the name in little more than a whisper, her eyes scanning the street as if she were worried about a peacekeeper appearing from thin air and hearing her. Though it was unlikely any of them would become suspicious even if they saw them, Katniss stepped to one side, allowing her friends to step into the house.

"Haymitch?" Katniss clarified as Madge set the tin on the kitchen table. "Why, exactly, does he have medicine that would help Prim?"

For all his love for alcohol, Katniss hadn't suspected Haymitch of having other types of drug problems.

"We asked him to get it," Peeta admitted.

He was looking at Prim, not Katniss, but he couldn't disguise the flush of his cheeks.

"What?"

Peeta winced, but he braced himself, turning to face her.

"Actually, Gale did the asking. He's the one who went to Haymitch."

"After I asked him to," Madge added.

Something had emboldened her. She looked more confident in her actions than she had moments ago as she took a step towards Katniss, her head high.

"I don't really get how Gale managed to convince Abernathy of anything," Peeta said.

"That's not important," Madge said with a wave of her hand.

Katniss narrowed her eyes, sure Madge knew more than Peeta did about the situation. She let herself be distracted, though, as Madge brought her attention back to the tin on the table.

"Peeta and I were able to scrape together some money."

"There was no way it was enough," Peeta hastened to add. "Abernathy had to have paid for most of it himself."

"He told Gale we had enough."

"And you believe him?" Peeta asked, eyebrows raised. "People in the Capitol spend fortunes on these sort of things."

Madge shrugged.

"What's important," she said, "is that we got the medicine, and it'll help."

Katniss stared down at the tin.

"You're sure it's what she needs?"

"Mom's doctor says it is," said Madge. "He was pretty confident about it. He said it wouldn't hurt her at any rate."

Taking a deep breath, Katniss removed the lid of the tin and was greeted with the underwhelming sight of a white bottle of pills. She may not have been given Capitol-produced medicine much in her life, but she was familiar enough with it to recognize that nothing about this bottle looked unique or impressive.

With a shaking hand, she twisted the cap off the bottle, freeing the strange chemical scent of the contents.

She'd have been lying if she said she held no doubts about the medicine, but she knew it would work. Capitol medicine always did. Sometimes too well if the morphlings were anything to go by.

Most Capitol drugs didn't produce that kind of dependence, Katniss had to remind herself as she carried the pills towards Prim. She hesitated once she was at Prim's side. The young girl was still sleeping, unable to take anything, and Katniss felt a strange urge to wait for her mother's guidance.

She turned to Peeta and Madge and was surprised to see Peeta right behind her, smiling gently. He didn't say anything as he placed a cautious hand against her upper back, calming the worst of her anxiety.

They had medicine. It would be okay. At least for a while.

 **A/N: So, one more chapter to go!**


	31. Chapter 31

Katniss stared out at the darkening sky, willing her heart to calm.

She'd nearly collapsed from relief when her mother had returned home. There hadn't been a conscious decision to leave Prim's care entirely to her bewildered mother, but there she was, sitting on the doorstep, not doing anything to help while her mother tended to Prim inside.

When the door opened behind her, she could hear Madge speaking, and she knew immediately that it was Peeta who was standing behind her. Without glancing back at him, she scooted to the side, allowing him to sit beside her.

He opened his mouth to speak, but Katniss, not wanting to hear the obligatory, "Are you okay?" spoke before he could.

"When you first helped Prim, I couldn't understand why. It made no sense. You'd never spoken to her or to me. Yet there you were practically carrying my little sister into Madge's house. It was one of the most confusing things I'd ever seen someone do, which meant you had to have an ulterior motive. I didn't trust you."

Peeta took his time answering.

"Did you ever discover my ulterior motive?"

Katniss looked at him, taking advantage of the fact he was looking away from her to spend time committing his features to memory.

"Yes," she admitted, "but I don't know that I'd call it an ulterior motive anymore."

Peeta turned to her, eyebrows raised.

"That doesn't help me understand it much more than I did before," she continued. "Nothing about this," she motioned between them, "makes sense. You're from town; you have a million friends. Life would be easier for you if you stuck to them."

Peeta's brow creased.

"That wouldn't make me happy," he said quietly.

For a long moment, neither of them spoke. Then, Peeta scooted closer to Katniss. It wasn't by much. She still couldn't feel him beside her, but the proximity left her stomach fluttering in a way that made her take a steadying breath.

"I never thought about any of that," Peeta said. "Back when I helped Prim… I don't want you to think I planned it to get anything out of it. I didn't. Hell, I was half convinced you and Gale were secretly dating back then."

Katniss choked on air, and it took several seconds for her to regain herself. Peeta managed to look both amused and embarrassed by the reaction.

"What?" Katniss managed as soon as she was able to speak.

Peeta gave a short nod and continued.

"I know you're not now of course, but back then… I wasn't the only one who thought you might be, but that's not the point. The point is I didn't think I stood a chance. When you let me walk you and Prim home, I was shocked. That was more than I'd expected. Let alone this."

He motioned between them, and Katniss found herself scooting closer. She'd never been drawn to people. Even when it came to Gale, it wasn't often that she actively desired to spend time with him. It was more that he was either there or he wasn't.

Peeta was different.

Even before they'd spoken, she'd been drawn to him. At first, it had been nothing more than curiosity about the boy who would take a beating to give her family bread. It had taken time for it to become more, but Katniss remained fascinated by him in a way she'd never expected to feel about anyone.

She reached out to take one of his hands in both of her own. It anchored her as her mother tended to Prim inside.

"When she was six, Prim decided to plan her wedding. She told me about everything. It was like something straight out of a television program, not reality, but after she'd been going on for a while, she asked me what my wedding would be like, and I just asked, 'What wedding?' She bothered me about it for days, insisting that I plan for one. I still think that was ridiculous."

Peeta squeezed her fingers, and Katniss offered him a small smile.

"It's not as if I ever made a conscious decision not to get married," she continued. "Having kids, that I never wanted. Marriage, I just didn't stop to think about."

When she glanced at Peeta, his lips were turned up in a small grin. He didn't appear horrified by the idea of Katniss never wanting children, which was more than Katniss could have said for Prim.

He gave a short nod of understanding and scooted closer so that their bodies aligned. She could feel him against her, his presence and warmth calming her even as her heart raced.

"I don't know what to do next," she admitted in a whisper, watching Peeta carefully.

He gave her a gentle smile that left her wondering why that had worried her in the first place. After a second's hesitation, he lifted one of her hands, still grasping his, to his lips, kissing it. It sent chills down Katniss arm and spine, making goosebumps erupt across her skin. She couldn't help but smile.

"That's fine," Peeta said. "We'll figure it out."

 **A/N: And that's the end. I realize there will probably be people out there that will be angry there's not even a kiss on the lips here, but honestly, considering the story and Katniss, this felt the best to me. I originally wrote it as a kiss on the lips, and it didn't feel right, leading me to rework the scene.**

 **Of course, I imagine the rebellion breaking out soon after this, but I'm not sure at this point that I'll write a sequel about it. With Katniss not being the Mockingjay, she would play a minor role in the war, and though I know a story could be told there, I'm not planning to write it now. (I'd never discount it entirely for the future, but I feel as if writing about a war makes you enter a mindset that I just don't want to dive into at this point in time.) When I set out to write this, I really just wanted to explore how Katniss and Peeta might end up together without the games, not write about an alternate rebellion despite the rebellion necessarily brewing in the background with or without the Mockingjay.**

 **All that being said, I'm working on a canon universe story set several decades after Mockingjay if anyone's interested in sticking around for that.**


End file.
